


Black Flame

by witchkings



Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms, The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Anal Sex, Canon Divergence, Dragons, Gore, M/M, Mordor, Mpreg, Númenor, The One Ring - Freeform, Violence, War of Wrath, a pinch of silvergifting, angbang, baby bauglir, but not really, desperate housewife!Mairon, high priest mairon, insane!melkor, quest for the silmarils, spirit pregnancy, the cult of melkor, this spans a lot of years
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-08
Updated: 2020-10-13
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:07:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 42,599
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26357689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/witchkings/pseuds/witchkings
Summary: When Mairon is tasked with the governance of Tol-in-Gaurhoth, it feels to him more like a burden, a form of exile by a master that has forgotten the affection they once shared. Desperate and alone, Mairon takes matters into his own hands and forfeits his stronghold, making sure he can return to his master's side. Melkor's reaction is not at all what he expected.
Relationships: Morgoth Bauglir | Melkor/Sauron | Mairon
Comments: 37
Kudos: 105





	1. A Measure Of Desperation

**Author's Note:**

> This concept has been birthed (haha) as usual by my friend (eol on tumblr) and myself in a long-winded discussion one night in deep dark winter. It was supposed to be a joke because I'm not into mpreg, but turned super serious very quickly. The mpreg mechanics aren't conventional (because I'm still not into mpreg) but happen more on a spiritual level. Find out and see if you're interested :D Hope you enjoy.
> 
> The fic is named after the song 'Black Flame' by Bury Tomorrow which I absolutely adore.
> 
> Tws: gore and violence

Once upon a time, Mairon had fallen in love. Plummeted right out of the sky of moral high-ground and holy ambition, and into the deep abysses made up of dark visions of dominion and decay. The falling had begun with long nails scraping over his flushed cheeks, a hiss like ice cracking, a “You will belong to me.” It had ended with Mairon on his knees, Melkor’s cock so far down his throat that it touched his Feä, a long string of saliva hanging off his chin, a loud groan of “You are mine.” 

The falling had halted, as all things in motion were bound to sooner or later, but the love remained. To this day, Mairon carried it, etched into the essence of his being. It was what hollowed out his heart’s chambers, it was what filled his bones for marrow. It had destroyed and replaced many things in his body and as such he kept it tucked away until such moments where it was bound to resurface. Where his master called upon it, for better or for worse. 

Incidentally, those moments had thinned out over the years, sparse and brittle like the flora in Melkor’s hand-crafted desolations. Mairon suspected that, while he was chained, steady in his loyalties and affections, Melkor was the one doing the falling now. Simply not in the desired direction. This was the evidence, so far as Mairon had gathered it: 

Firstly, Melkor had not bedded him since the capture of Maedhros some four-hundred years past. No coal-stained teeth that split open his skin, no caressing insults to give him shivers, no thrusts of Melkor’s mighty cock to bring Mairon to the brink of consciousness. How dearly he missed that feral state of being, that permission to stop thinking. Reduced to pain and pleasure, the way he had been before. Before all of this. Mairon knew not why Melkor had stopped and the one time he had pushed his luck, had suggested with a desire-laced tone that he and Melkor engage in such a way, he had been met with a stare so blank and frosty that he had recoiled and smothered any further urges. 

Secondly, Melkor had taken to calling Mairon by another name. Sauron, the Abhorred. A name given to him by petty children in their war games. A name Mairon did not dislike by principle, but which made him sick to the stomach when it passed the lips of his beloved king. It created distance, pushed them apart where Mairon would have them conjoined. One snapped ‘Sauron’ and any hopes of rekindling what had once been between them extinguished. 

And lastly, most fatefully, Melkor had sent Mairon away to invade Minas Tirith, govern Tol-in-Gaurhoth as one of their outposts without so much as a word of parting. It had been Mairon’s idea, a strategic move to gain a more deeply rooted control over the Northern lands of Beleriand and he had recognized its brilliance and flaws likewise. Had expected Melkor to deny it categorically under the claim that he needed Mairon in Angband to fulfill his duties of managing the finely tuned cogs of his kingdom. It had been that way since Melkor’s exile and Mairon was nurtured only by the trust Melkor put in him. And, yes, by the growing dependency of his master on him too. As Melkor decayed under the influence of the Silmarils, skin coming off in flakes, eyes dulling, mind muddling, Mairon became the one who pulled the strings. 

With the world shifting under the weight of its wars and Melkor slowly descending into madness, their love had been the one constant to keep it all afloat. And now, Mairon knew not what held them together except for his own clinical commitment. 

He contemplated all this as he paced the circular room he had taken as his private chambers, sure the rough red tiles would fall to dust under his hard leather boots ere the decade was spent. Objectively, things looked bright. Well, dark. Mairon had managed to distribute their resources to optimal capacity. The orcs thrived, pillaging and raping their way through whatever small settlements they could find. He himself had drawn up at least two dozens maps of new battle formations for the no doubt upcoming Battle To End It All, had shaped Thuringwethil into a reliable second-in-command, and had even captured that Noldorin Princeling Finrod and his disgusting human pet. Beren. 

With all this under his belt, Mairon felt accomplished enough to gather his supplies and make away with the gaping voids that threatened to consume him from the inside. The spaces that Melkor usually filled. Felt ready to journey back to Angband where he could be more effective and prepare their troupes. Expand their empire. Win Melkor his long desired crown. Where he could be called ‘lieutenant’ again with that quivering undertone that managed to convey both adoration and exquisite contempt at the same time. 

Mairon stopped in the middle of the room and raked his gauntleted hand through his hair, unraveling auburn braids. 

“How vile you are,” he growled and kicked a chair by his desk sending it clattering to the ground. How vile you are for not desiring me as I do you.

“What an honor, mylord.” Mairon whirled around. Thuringwethil leaned in the doorway, obsidian hair fanned out in waves over her bare shoulders. As per usual, her raiment was airy to a point that was scandalous by Noldorin standards. Mairon could not care less for the extent to which her cleavage was exposed as long as she did her job. Cloth made her feel caged.

Mairon cursed himself for being so distracted by his woes that he had not heard the door open, had not sensed her as she’d come up the stone steps. His spirit was sensitive enough under normal circumstances.

“State your business.”

“May I speak freely?” Thuringwethil shifted on her feet and Mairon gestured for her to do so. His feet took up the pace again, more comfortable moving around, hoping that the ground would give in soon. “I am annoyed. Watching you succumb to this self-fashioned misery is annoying. It might not hinder your work, but it hinders the enjoyment you have of it. He sent you away, that is a fact which you cannot change, especially not by haunting this place like some love-sick mortal. Get over it, mylord, if not for your own sake, then for mine. Whatever sort of relationship the two of you had, it is withered. All you can do now is to make sure you do not follow its trails. You are more than his servant, you know?” 

“Am I? Truly?” Mairon asked, shoulders sagging. 

“Well.” Thuringwethil shrugged. “To me you are. You do not have to say more, I simply wanted to get that off my chest. Oh, and also, that prissy Doriath princess is bound for our humble castle to retrieve her filthy lover.”

“Which one of them? There are so many…” Mairon said and stopped in an attempt to regain some composure. Fake nonchalance. The mere mention of that whore made his blood boil. Melkor had been obsessed with her for the past decade or so. Claiming they ought to capture her because she was too powerful, would spell their demise. It was plain that Melkor thought her beautiful. Mairon gritted his teeth. 

“It is unlike you to forget a name,” Thuringwethil said and raised her eyebrow. Her lips curled in amusement. “But if you must know, Luthien is her name and she is the fairest of them all. Her voice is liquid starlight and her smile bears their radiance. Take but one glance at her and you will fall in love. She walks a trail of broken hearts for she has given herself to a mortal. Or so they say. Can you believe that? A mortal.” She snorted. 

Mairon was aware, of course, knew more about Luthien than Thuringwethil would be comfortable with. Thanks to the obsessive behavior of his master. He growled. He wanted to end Luthien. Carve open her chest with his bare hands and rip out her heart, make her scream for his mercy and receive only his hatred. But more desperately than that, Mairon wanted to go home. 

So, he made a simple decision. A decision to face her. 

If he won, Melkor would be satisfied, might even show appreciation in the shape of his stinging lips on Mairon’s skin. 

If he lost, he would have to return to Angband a failure, an outcast, a prisoner. Mairon smiled. Even punishment and dungeons were more attention than he had gotten in a long time. 

“Let us welcome her,” he said, and Thuringwethil grinned, exposing two sharp fangs. 

“Understood.” With a ghastly shriek, she turned into a bat, wings flapping, and swooped past him, out of the window. 

She would wait on one of the outer towers for her moment on the stage. Mairon would lose Thuringwethil that day, and he would find himself barely able to care. He would also lose Draugluin and though that loss hit deeply, the pain was not strong enough to scrape at his conscious thought, not when it was overflowing with Melkor’s thunderous voice, his luminous eyes, his charred hand as he put it to Mairon’s skin. No matter the intention.

He had not accounted for Luthien’s strength, however, and she hurt him more severely than any of the Iluvatar’s children had managed in their time. Had given him wounds he would carry for the rest of his life.

He had not thought that Melkor might succumb to her spell as well, that the war, the Silmarils, the ages of the world had taken too much of a toll on him. That his master would be scarred and robbed as a consequence of Mairon’s failure. 

He had not imagined that this plan of his, driven purely by emotion and abandonment, would turn out to be a hit harder than any lost battle could have been. 

He would have never believed himself to be this careless. 

In the end, there was no telling whether Mairon would have had a chance against Luthien. What he could tell was that he had messed up in spectacular fashion and that he would be lucky if Melkor ever looked at him again.

So, his head hung and a thousand apologies ready to spill from his bruised and bloodied lips, Mairon returned to Angband. And what he found there frightened him to his core. 

Angband had not towered in her primal glory for centuries, her pulsating heart of ichor-like darkness and architectural cleanliness ever slowing. Dreaded was the day that it would take its final beat, but not now, not yet.

Living inside the castle had granted him ignorance of this fact, of knowing that their grand fortress, the birthplace of all their malicious schemes and demonstrations of cruelty was crumbling to dust around them. It happened parallel to the decay of Melkor’s mind. 

Explicitly, when he threw a rage-tantrum and the void within him spilled over so that the ground shook and the walls trembled and the structure around them groaned and cracked. The effects of this were even more devastating when Mairon was not around to be the target of Melkor’s fury and he took it out on his surroundings.

And implicitly, too. As Melkor’s paranoia festered in the crevices of his skull so the mortar grew weak and the stone brittle. Walls that would have held off Elven legions only a hundred years before were on the verge of collapse from too strong a gale. There were phases when Melkor’s hallucinations intensified to a point where he could no longer discern between vision and reality and during one of those the Eastern tower had collapsed in its entirety. 

Before his trip to Tol-in-Gaurhoth, Mairon had worked entire moon cycles to keep the castle intact, but the constant shifting and rearranging of the stone and the non-too-pleasant nature of its inhabitants had taken its toll on the base of the structure. 

It was bad though not beyond hope. As long as Mairon was there to hold it all up over their head, figuratively and literally, Angband was going to last another year, another war, another age. 

During his time away, he had not worried for her either. It would have torn the tattered rags of his patience right out of his fingers to have to consider that, too. Mairon had to believe that she would still stand when he returned, had to believe that Melkor was sane enough not to destroy the very place he resided him. 

Foolish, it turned out. 

What Mairon looked upon when he returned from, airborne and brimming with the need to gaze upon his master, was more of a ruin than a fortress. Of the original obsidian spires none remained and three of the four towers had imploded so that the main building was surrounded by piles of rubble that were coated in ice. The dominant part of Angband still stood, cutting high into the turmoiled air and covered in shadow, but when Mairon drew closer, wings flapping against what was sure to become a blizzard, he could see that she only impressed from far away. There had been few windows to begin with, but they had all been smashed in and barred with crude planks. The outer layer of dark, green-veined marble was cracked in places. The atmosphere around the building was bleak, dead. 

Mairon reached out his spirit towards it, tried to feel for her heart and was met with a low whine, akin to a prisoner’s plea for release. It broke his heart, there was no other expression for it, even though he technically did not have one. Angband, his own creation, another victim of Melkor’s campaign against all of existence. He had sucked the life out of her clean and cold and now it was on Mairon to salvage what was left. A sorry heap of broken stone. 

All around the perimeter, shacks and tents had been erected, crude and dirty constructions of stolen cotton that could barely hold off more than a light rainfall. Let alone a blizzard. Mairon soared higher, hid behind a scattering of clouds so the Orcs below would not raise the alarm. Though, on close inspection, most of them seemed to be sleeping. Some stumbled drunkenly around the encampment, some hit their companions to wake them. Mairon could taste the saccharine remnants of a strong enchantment on the wind and had to yawn as the stench hit his overly sensitive nostrils. Luthien had been fast then him then and had put the better part of their army into a slumber. Which was in itself a terrible prospect, but Mairon was more afraid of what she had done to his master. Could she have - but no. No such blasphemy. 

When the Eastern tower had first fallen, Mairon had issued passage to be dug underneath it which led directly into a mountain passage should it collapse again or the need for a swift flight arise. He landed at the mouth of that passage now, barely visible between two snow-covered boulders. Transforming back into a humanoid shape took longer than usual, not only because his body shifted shape, but worked to translate the wounds he had received as a wolf also. In order to make up for lost time, he had halted his self-healing powers and Luthien’s magic worked on his insides still. They felt twisted, too tight.

Once his feet hit the ground, shoes molding around them, Mairon stumbled towards the boulder to steady himself, slipped on the icy and fell to his knees. He vomited into the crisp snow, speckling it ruby red. With his vampire fur gone, the low temperatures bit at him and seeped into his bones. He summoned an extra layer of clothing, a sorry excuse for warmth. Had it been practical, Mairon would have walked this earth embraced by flame. Alas, it was not.

Mairon sighed, wiped the blood from his lips and pushed fresh snow over the signs of his weakness. There would be no spies this far north, but on the off-chance that some Elf lost his way, he did not want them to find the passage. 

With naught to see by but the glow of his own hands as he summoned his feä to cumulate there, Mairon made his way down the earthy passage, instantly more at ease at feeling soil and rock encompass him. Here, below ground, he could feel the faint vibrations of the castle and his lip quirked. He let his fingers trail the walls, taking this for the only welcome back he would get. 

Mairon emerged in a deserted basement chamber that was lined with wooden shelves. They were laden with abandoned treasures of past battles. Feänorian brooches that had collected enough cobwebs to be unrecognizable, chests full of dulled earrings from Doriath, Dwarfen war axes and little wooden toys their children played with. There was even the diadem Melkor had ripped from Fingolfin’s brow as he had fallen at his feet, a bright silver circlet set with sapphires and drab with misuse. Mairon knew not why they kept these useless trinkets, but it was not his place to destroy them. He extinguished his light.

Treading carefully, he clambered up the ladder, hissing from the bursts of agony the movement caused. He came out in the main hall of the North-Eastern wing which was part of the ring around the throne room. Mairon had to get a grasp of the damage down before he could face his master. He slipped down a corridor to the left where their commanding officers lodged, those spirits that remained from the olden days and the first wars suffused with the odd Orc blessed with extraordinary intelligence given their natural dispositions. A glacial draft whispered down the hall and Mairon could not see farther than the tip of his nose. He hummed a few notes under his breath and along the walls torches flared up and illuminated broken murals, crumbling bricks. A few doors hung off their hinges, though most were intact. Mairon could feel the spirits behind the closed ones, caught in a doze, but the open rooms were deserted and in haste. This too he attributed to the Doriath witch.

Hands trembling, Mairon returned to the main hall and made his way down a set of sundered steps to find the majority of the forges dead. Dry coal dissipated under his finger tips and the ground was scattered with tools and metal clippings. Mairon huffed as he passed the last two furnaces which glowed faintly. The heat was enough to warm his toes though and the only real light seeped into the room from another stairway that led down to the adjacent Balrog quarters. For a brief breath, he considered going down there to see if the spell had affected the demons as well, but thought better of it. The Balrogs were particular about whom they let into their caves and Mairon was not welcome there. A pity, really, as it was the one place in Angband where the temperature was high enough that he could thrive. 

Worry gnawed along the insides of his ribcage as Mairon made a final stop to his tour. His own chambers where he kept those few possessions he prized above all. He would have thought them safe with his master. He would have thought that Melkor had planned for him to return. When he opened the door, however, Mairon found the room devoid of anything but dust. Gone were his dress-robes, his favorite mace, gone were his collected writings and notes. A dry sob stuck in his throat and the pain of it was worse than Luthien’s song. Melkor had cut him out of his schemes, had taken his home and had made a ghost town out of Angband.

But Mairon did not indulge in releasing the emotion. He hadn’t returned to mourn, but to receive what punishment he deserved. Should he be destroyed at Melkor’s hand, he would meet a kinder fate than to linger in this forsaken place and be shunned by his master until Arda was remade. No, he thought and readjusted the thin belt he wore over his robes. As he looked down himself he saw that blood had seeped through the fabric where it was taut over his hips and he cursed, waving away the stains. To show Melkor that he had suffered under the hand of another would be most unwise. Mairon focused his limited healing powers on that area so the skin would not tear again and hurried down the steps towards the throne room, combing a cramping hand through his hair as he went. He was in no shape to meet Melkor’s stately fury. He was unworthy, broken, a failure. It was his Feä, beating as a steady heart, a faithful drum in his chest, that drove him onward. To look upon a beloved face one last time would surely fix everything. Mairon threw open the set of double doors and froze. 

The vast hall was empty safe for a couple dozing wolves to Mairon’s left who growled faintly. A trail of red lead all the way to the dais and Mairon could discern the footsteps of the intruders as they had left the castle. He followed them into hell. 

Melkor was slumped at the base of his throne, an awkwardly angled heap of dark hair, ill-tainted skin and rusted armor that sported several holes. The charred skin of Melkor’s hand was visible from where Mairon hovered and they looked even more withered than he remembered. As though they had been turned to stone, the nails cracked in the process. There was blood also, pooling near where Melkor’s face was hidden by the iron crown that had toppled off his head. Of the fateful gems two remained and Mairon gasped at their sight, both in horror and relief. 

Unsure steps carried him closer to his master, slow at first, then he hurried the last few feet and fell to his knees by Melkor’s, removing the iron crown with two fingers. His arm shook with the effort, it was heavy, but he could not risk additional injury at the hand of the Silmarils. Mairon let it fall down to his said and brushed back the hair that stuck to his master’s face. 

“If you wish to maim me further, I would advise you to be quick.” Melkor’s rough voice scratched over Mairon’s eardrums. It was so unlike he remembered it and yet it loosened something inside of his chest.

“I would not hurt you if my very life depended on it,” Mairon murmured in reply and dabbed at the bleeding cut on Melkor’s face with the sleeve of his robe, extending some of his own Feä into the skin. It was crucial energy and he could not spare it, but he did so without much thought. Melkor would always come first. 

“Lieutenant?” Melkor’s face shifted, muscles working. Crunched up and smoothed over several times, accompanied by heavy, rattling breaths. Then, his eyes lifted as though pulled by heavy weights, and his hazed gaze fell on Mairon. Sizzling. 

“Yes.” Mairon cupped Melkor’s cheek, poured more of his powers into Melkor’s Feä. Through this connection he could feel the last remainders of Luthien’s song replay in Melkor’s head, could feel the raw despair of losing one of the Silmaril’s and it tore his wounds back open. Mairon groaned and closed his eyes, focusing on giving Melkor life. 

And as Melkor gradually woke, regained some of his vigor, Mairon felt himself fading. 

“Stop,” Melkor said and grabbed Mairon’s wrist. The bond broke and Mairon felt hollowed out. Only Melkor’s touch kept him tethered to consciousness, the steady warmth of his rough fingers, the faint vibrations of his returned powers. Mairon smiled. 

“There is more I can do for you,” he said. 

“You have done enough.” Melkor heaved himself to his feet, let go of Mairon in the process. The room spun and the cavity in Mairon’s chest expanded to his arms, his legs, his head. He screamed, but no sound came out, screamed as his vision blotted out. He keeled over, and this time the scream burst from him, short-lived when his head hit the naked stone. It was as good of an ending as he would get.


	2. A Night of Wonders

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoy, thank you always to my friend for beta-reading and constantly giving input (you know who you are, ily <3) :) 
> 
> Warnings for sexual content and violent themes.

When Mairon awoke it was not to the towering figure of his father casting judgment, as he would have thought his demise to play out, nor to the echoing, empty depths of those holding cells in Mandos reserved for the wicked. Instead, he woke to a soft orange light tickling his cheeks. He lay on a fluffy mattress, was covered in furs, their weight settled comfortably against his naked chest. Mairon shifted under them and pressed a hand to his side to find the skin restored. The nausea too had receded and all that remained of his battle wounds was a faint, stabbing headache between his eyes.

I live, he thought with a pang of disappointment.

“Yes,” Melkor said. He sat on the ground by the fireplace, both hands planted on the rug behind him and studying the flames which cast his face into an eerie glow. They elongated his sharp nose and lashes, hardened the set of his mouth. He had taken off his armor and was clad in simple dark breeches and a linen shirt. Mairon blinked at the sight, headache making way for wonder. He had not seen Melkor this outwardly vulnerable for a long time, if ever. 

“I thought…” Mairon trailed off and turned on his back to stare at the ceiling which was adorned with curling serpents of brass and rusted iron. These were Melkor’s chambers then, a small part of Mairon that had survived the long decay. 

“It was foolish of you to exhaust yourself as you did. Though I appreciate the self-sacrifice, I’d ask of you not to risk yourself again. A few seconds longer and you would have been beyond my reach.”

“… thank you, mylord.”

“Oh,” Melkor said and yawned noisily. “You should thank Glaurung as well. He kept you warm.” 

“How?” Mairon asked though he had a notion he could do without the knowledge. Whether it meant Glaurung had roasted him, swallowed him whole or sat on top of him so his simmering chest was pressed against Mairon’s, did not matter. What mattered was that he was now in a state to face his failings. And that his master did not have to wait any longer to cast judgment. 

The bed dipped as Melkor’s weight settled on it and Mairon sank deeper into the furs. Yielding the comfort of them seemed impossible and all the electric anticipation of his punishment had been replaced by an itch at the base of his spine. He did not want this moment to end, this moment suspended in time, just the two of them for once, comfortable and sane, did not want this moment to end with Melkor plucking his limbs like he was a chicken for roasting, or cleaving his skull to mar what was inside, or, worse yet, banishing him. Mairon had no one and nowhere to turn to, not after he’d sacrificed his two closest friend for this. A glimpse of a love long lost to Melkor’s vision. Perished, as so many had, at his own marred hands. Mairon drew his shoulders closer to his ears. 

“Why do you fear me?” Melkor asked and brushed Mairon’s hair back from his face. He leaned over him, blocking all escape routes, and his own black strands tickled Mairon’s cheeks. “What have I done to you?”

“I only fear being parted from you,” Mairon replied.

“What have I done to you?” The question came more urgent this time, Melkor’s brow crunched in thought. Surely, he had to know that answer. Did he not?

“Mylord?” 

“I understand that I have not been myself as of late. My dreams have taken me beyond the corporeal world, beyond even such darkness as I can comprehend it. My days have been blinded by the gems and blighted by your absence. The rift between the is and the has-to-be is wide, it is undeniable. But to see you look upon me with such blatant fear in your heart. Quivering as though you were one of them.” Melkor hissed that last word and Mairon barely suppressed a flinch. “It pains me. Have I mistreated you so profoundly that you shy away from my touch?”

Mairon squinted. Was he dead after all? Was this a cruel vision to torture him into madness or had he, for some twisted reason, landed in his personal paradise where Melkor would care for him for the rest of eternity? It was nice, for a change, but Mairon knew he would tire of it. 

“You do not believe me? I suppose you have always needed thorough convincing.” Melkor waved and the furs folded in on themselves and piled up by the foot of the bed, leaving Mairon’s body exposed to his master, his doom. He did not tremble in fear though, not with the heat coursing through him and climbing into his cheeks, and his mortal shell aroused, aching. 

“I am not afraid,” he whispered as Melkor nuzzled his cheek, then buried his face against Mairon’s neck, placing hot kisses there as he climbed atop him. Straddled his hips. The pressure on his cock was heavy, almost crushed it, but Mairon moaned anyway, soaking up being the sole focus of Melkor’s attention. Melkor’s dry lips raked over Mairon’s skin and he bit at the junction of shoulder and neck. A sharp rip tore through the air as the linen shirt was pulled from Melkor’s body by an invisible force and the breeches followed suit. 

When Melkor too was bare, Mairon let his hands come up to his master’s chest, trace the scars there with breathless reverence, then wrapped his arms around Melkor’s middle, clinging to it because he was afraid, clinging to it because it was part of his song, written into his essence, clinging to it because this was all he had left. He blinked rapidly, his chest brimming and buzzing with emotion, but he would not grant himself this humiliation. Being kicked at and torn asunder was nothing. Crying in front of Melkor, letting him see deeply enough into the core of his Feä to realize how in love he still was, would be his downfall.Melkor would never let him hear the end of it. Although it was unlikely his master was ignorant to this fact. His graciousness triumphed all. 

“Mairon,” Melkor crooned and his fingertips caught the tear from the corner of Mairon’s eyes before it could escape. He bent lower until their lips met for a chaste kiss that had Mairon’s head spin. “I have missed you so.” 

“You have?” 

“All the time,” Melkor said and without much fanfare, he pushed open Mairon’s legs, settling his heavy weight between them. Mairon, aware of what was coming, willed his limbs to loosen, his muscles to melt further into the bed and then Melkor was pushing into him. Shoved his cock in all the way, stretching Mairon to the point of breaking and this came closer to what he had expected, until the pain subsided and a pleasant burn flared up in Mairon’s lower half. He dry-sobbed into Melkor’s neck, unable to recall how it had come to this.

“Have you missed me also?” Another trust had Mairon think that Melkor would carve his body open anyway, but he withstood the onslaught and worked to relax his muscles, prepare his body for the next one. No more came. No more sizzling pleasure, only harsh cold loss as Melkor retreated. Mairon whimpered. 

“Answer me.”

“I have missed you,” he hastened to say. “So desperately and profoundly that the thought of being back by your side consumed me.”

“And you made sure you would be, did you not?” Melkor’s coarse fingers wrapped around the base of Mairon’s cock and pulled harshly, sharp pain momentarily white-washing his vision.

“Yes,” he cried out. “I confess.”

“You forfeited your stronghold. You ruined us.”

“I never meant-” 

“Shh.” Melkor released him and gently pushed back into Mairon, let his whole weight settle on top of his chest. The weight of the world, the weight of the void, oppressive, glorious. “I understand.” Melkor’s lips brushed his cheek and he started moving his hips again, fast though never uncontrolled. It was incomprehensible, the sentiment and the blessing of this conjunction. Mairon forgot himself, forgot where he ended and where Melkor began, and wondered how he had ever endured a state of existence other than this. His form fuzzed at the edges, dissolving into that of his master as if his Feä wanted out to melt into Melkor’s and sparks of it rose from Mairon’s skin as Melkor pounded into him. 

They came not at the same time, but seconds apart. Melkor with a barely audible groan, Mairon with more throaty sobs. He was filled with relief and happiness and Melkor and prayed to all the demons of their court, to his father, yes even to the wicked powers in the West, that this moment might never end. 

“Thank you,” he said as Melkor rolled off him and not another word was uttered for a long time, the crackling fire the only sound to lull Mairon away from reality. 

He dozed off with a faint ache in his chest, the most content he had been in half a millenium. As all things went with Melkor, there was no guarantee it would last. 

  
“Mairon,” Melkor whispered into the dark, hours later. Mairon blinked off the sleepiness and gazed up at Melkor who sat beside him, still in a state of undress and staring at the empty air before him.

“Yes, mylord?”

“Can you save us?” Mairon turned on his side to face the warmth of Melkor’s voice, the freezing skin of his body, drawing his knees to his chest. A tiny ache scratched at the insides of his chest, the aftermath of such an intense merging of souls, surely, and laying as such released the pain a little. Mairon pressed his forehead against Melkor’s hip, grateful for the cool skin against his heated face.

“Yes, mylord,” he said. He was far from certain, but he was determined and had to hope that would suffice. 

  
When Mairon awoke the next morning, Melkor had disappeared from his chambers and the fire had died down to a heap of simmering coals that did nothing to quell the shiver he fell into upon slipping out of the furs. A stack of folded clothes sat atop the mantel piece and Mairon hastened to dress himself. They were fresh, a linen shirt and tunic that whispered against his skin as he handled them, smelling of the snowy peaks outside. A faint tang of Melkor’s magic clung to them, like burnt hair. There were breeches also, soft deer skin that hugged his legs. Warm as though the animal had just been skinned. To top it, Melkor had provided a long charcoal and red robe that was laced at the back with fine golden string and had embroidered cuffs, golden flame circling Mairon’s wrists. He swallowed heavily as he slipped into it. Melkor had kept his belongings after all. Or at the very least, had held onto their memory. 

Once dressed, Mairon felt out of breath. He rubbed his chest where the ache had settled over night, throbbing dully now. It pulsated so deeply inside of him that he could not reach it with his powers and so it stayed, persistent and uncomfortable enough to make him squirm. He pressed his palm harder into the spot, but that amplified the pain and so he moved on to comb the grime of the last days out of his hair. Hoped he could expel the shame of his defeat with it. The dirt, sweat and blood persisted too, clinging to every inch of his scalp. Mairon shuddered and moved on to braid it at least. 

Before he could though, a flurry of sharp knocks interrupted him and a low-ranking Orc, less than a common foot solider judging by his tattered tunic and his missing foot, stumbled in, his arms stretched out in front of him. 

“So very unhappy to have to disturb you,” he cackled quickly. “Truly, my lord, so very dismayed. I do not mean to take up more of your precious time than absolutely necessary, but the master has tasked me with-”

“Just say your piece,” Mairon interrupted and rekindled the flame in the hearth with a click of his tongue that made the Orc flinch back. 

“You are to attend the master in the throne room. Now.”

Leave me alone and send some Orc-scum to fetch me, why not, Mairon thought and shoved the Orc aside, passing him. He was going to give Melkor a piece of his mind. He was going to- 

“Gnn,” Mairon gasped, clutching his hand over his heart where the pain stabbed him more sharply than before and stopped him dead in his tracks. It set his body ablaze, white-washed his vision. He willed it away, focused all his Feä on that spot, but it did naught more than waver along the edges. It gave him the ability to walk on, though not without having every breath he drew rattle in his chest. Mairon’s cheeks felt hotter than they had the night before as he approached the back door of the throne room. He knew he felt more in disarray than he looked, but that gave him an itch under his skin. Without control over himself, what did he have left? The answer rested a wall away from him. He sensed others there too and tilted his chin up.

Pushing his palms out, Mairon let it bang open and walked through. He came face to face with the highest-ranking individuals of Melkor’s court, all lined up before the throne. AS Mairon took his place by his master’s side, Melkor’s form did not betray his arrival which was a good sign, everything considered. Mairon lifted his chin even higher, made himself tall which had an immediate effect on the few Orcs in the room. They shrank back with low mutters. Glaurung lowered his head which was shrouded in a cloud of steam, and Gothmog raised his wings in greeting. 

“Mylord,” Mairon said, bowing his head to Melkor. Then he raised his brow to the others. “Commanders.”

An echo of that word came flying back at him in various degrees of grunting. More steam poured from Glaurung’s nostrils.

“Very well,” Melkor said. He had his head propped up on his chin, his body weight slumped over the arm of his throne. The two-jeweled crown added to the asymmetrical look of him which made it difficult for Mairon to keep his gazed affixed to Melkor’s face. He could not look away either and so his eyes watered as Melkor spoke. “Now that the Lieutenant has rejoined us here in Angband, we can return to business as usual,” Melkor said and, when no protest arose, gestured for Mairon to take the room as though no time had passed between the last council Mairon had attended and today. 

It can be as simple as this, Mairon thought, biting back on his grin. Perhaps Melkor had forgiven him. Perhaps the sanity had returned to his madness and so glory would return to Angband and the whole North. He cleared his throat. Picked up the threads of leadership again as easily as though picking up his hammer and tongs. He knew of Melkor’s intentions without having to inquire. 

Hands clasped behind his back, Mairon ignored the pain that constricted his throat, and paced the room. He could taste the other creatures’ discomfort, acidic on the air, as he passed behind their backs. To them, he was still second-in-command, almost as vengeful and even stricter than Melkor, and the defeat against Luthien had settled to deeply with all of them for Mairon to be singled out. To be marked as the one who had brought ruin upon them. Glaurung squirmed as Mairon walked behind him, out of his field of vision, and the Orcs glanced over their shoulders, following his movements rather than fixating on Melkor. Mairon bit down on the pleasure this gave him and put on his best face of disappointment. A curl of the lips, narrowed eyes that spilled harsh light. 

“The state of this place is unacceptable,” he proclaimed and at once, the Orcs muttered apologies, but he gestured for them to keep quiet. “It is high time we accelerate the war machine once more, prepare for battles to come. For the battle.” A cold breeze rustled clothes, had Gothmog’s chest flicker. “Our forges are cold, our numbers are dwindled. We cannot afford that, and I expect you all to put forth your very best effort to remedy this. Those Noldorin rats grow restless as they gain support among their distant and not so distant kin. Glaurung, how are the hatch-lings coming along?”

“Slowly, mylord,” the Dragon puffed, giving off puffs of flame that went out with a pop. “Many of them are young still, but there are those who can and may fight under your banner. Ancalagon is another matter though.” Mairon ignored that last part. It was something he would have to deal with himself. Later.

“Let them grow for another century then, it is nothing to us. Gothmog?”

“We are, as always, ready to serve and assist in preparations any way we may.”

“Good. I want you to rally the others and focus on the breeding of the Orcs. We need more soldiers. If you can, lend me one or two of your ranks to aid in the reconstruction of the housing wings. I suspect those tents will have to make way for a battle field sooner rather than later. Grimbuk?” 

Grimbuk was an Orc built like a wardrobe who wore a set of outer teeth over his jaw, made of black titanium. A broken axe had been smashed into his skull, giving him an overall look of savagery. He gave a quick report on the status of their troop, focused on sensitivities rather than numbers. Gothmog supplied Mairon with the additional statistics he needed to calculate the growth rates necessary to over-match Feänor’s sons and their allies. Soon enough, the puzzle piece clicked together in Mairon’s mind, numbers and logistics, and oh, but he had missed this. His own little kingdom at Tol-in-Gaurhoth had been nothing compared to this. Command and control over all the hosts of Angband, diminished though they were. Power surged through his veins, but he quelled the ecstasy lest Melkor pick up on it. He was too easily suspicious. 

“That should suffice for now,” Mairon said when Grimbuk ran out of relevant information and was babbling for the sake of it. “Grimbuk, carry on as you have. Help with the breeding, make weapons for yourselves. We will meet again for further strategizing. For now, consider yourselves dismissed.”

Once Gothmog and the other commanding officers had filed out of the room, Mairon turned to Melkor and all thought of pride was abruptly extinguished by another flare-up of pain that took his breath away. If this was his punishment, a sort of slowly unfolding illness Mairon had only ever seen in men, he wanted to be sure of it at least. Leading an army with a body that failed him was unpractical, but could be prepared for.

“Mylord?” he asked tentatively, and sank to one knee before the dais. Melkor did not acknowledge that he had spoken. He stared at Mairon with empty, gray flecked eyes like ashes raining down upon the world. He was a statue, his chest unmoving, his lips sealed. Faint waves of energy that emanated from his skin the only indicator that he was alive. This shift almost had Mairon believe that the last night had been a fever dream. If it hadn’t been for the bruises sprinkled on his ribcage, the spot over his collar bone which he had deliberately left unhealed to remind himself, he would have dismissed the entire scene as a fantasy. But Melkor had been there. “I think I am ill.”

“Are you unfit for work?” Melkor replied, and folded his blackened hands. The two Silmarils in his crown shone as brightly as ever, though the gap where the third had been sucked their light in like it was a void of its own.

“No,” he said.”

“Then I do not see how this is any concern of mine.”

“Of course. Forgive me.” Mairon rose and hurried out of Melkor’s sight. This was a problem he would have to fix on his own, similarly to the work before him. Maybe it was simply that. Melkor’s madness had eaten away at the structure of Angband and now it needed something else to de-construct. And Mairon had offered his body so willingly. 

Then again, Melkor had seemed level-headed for the first time in forever last night. Focused even. Mairon sighed, decided to push the matter to later, when his labors were finished. 

Before he could begin on the towers, however, there was one stop he needed to make, one more soul to greet. Mairon slipped into his vampire form and out of the castle. In the northernmost peak of the Thangorodrim was a slanted cage in which most of the dragons resided. Huddled together for warmth or frying each other. He breezed past it, fighting against the harsh winds that cut him open with shards of ice. Behind the range lay another ave, carved deeply into the face of the earth and vaster than any realm of Eru’s mortal children would ever be. There lived what Mairon thought to be Melkor’s greatest creation. Ancalagon, a Dragon who would rain doom upon these lands in his time. He was not quite tame, not yet. Young and vulnerable, he would have much growing to do before the day of his release arrived, but already he was larger than a mountain. At least when last Mairon had visited him.

Because his mind was that of a youth still and his antics uncontrollable, Melkor kept Ancalagon under strict lock. With a sweep of his great wings and a deep breath out of the fiery pit that was his core, the Dragon could destroy Angband completely should he so desire. Better to ensure his loyalties first, Mairon agreed. As such was the dilemma with Dragons. They were mighty weapons, but they had a temperament which was at times unpredictable. Beyond even the King of Arda’s control. 

Mairon landed by the mouth of the cave which was all earth and barred with iron rods the diameter of large tree trunks. He slipped through them as he transformed. His clothes were soaked through to his skin, but the infernal mixture of burnt stone, sulfuric breath and dragon’s droppings wafted at him and dried them. 

With a small smile, Mairon descended and found Ancalagon laying on his back, his leathery wings folded as a blanket over his body though he was wide awake, peering at his own breath as it puffed. Dissipated. Puffed. Dissipated. A dozen sharp horns sprouted from the dragon’s skull like black spears and his eyes glowed a soft sunflower color. The ache in Mairon’s chest swelled at the sight, pity folding into the pain. It had to be terribly lonely down here and a creature of Ancalagon’s caliber had to be bored beyond its wits.

“I should visit you more often, should I not?” Mairon said into the half-dark and Ancalagon’s head whipped around, eyes widening. When he saw Mairon, he peeled open his giant maw and let out a fountain of flame that curled against the roof of the cave, fanning out in all directions. Of all the dragons they kept, Ancalagon had been the only one born mute, the trade-off for his great size and strength. That characteristic alone made him seem much younger than he was. Mairon watched with a smile as the Dragon rolled onto his feet and crawled towards Mairon, fangs gleaming in the light of the remaining fire. Once, Mairon had stepped too close to Ancalagon without letting him get used to his smell first, and he had paid for that with an arm. He remembered well how those teeth had torn through his flesh and was not keen on repeating the experience.

The Dragon nudged Mairon’s chest, overestimating his own strength so that Mairon stumbled backward, but was kept upright by a talon as long as his own body was tall. Ancalagon closed his large claw over Mairon, trapping him in a cage of his own, and pulled him towards his chest which shone brightly, and was heated by the fire in the Dragon’s lungs. Mairon let his Feä stream out of his body and pried Ancalagon’s talons apart with more force than necessary. Ancalagon drew in a sharp breath, but did not resist. He understood that now was not play time. 

“Sometime soon you will fly again, my love, I promise. But there is much work to do before that. I should go,” Mairon said and rested his forehead against rough scales. Ancalagon huffed and closed his wings over Mairon, basking him in absolute darkness. His eyes fell shut of their own accord, and though he hadn’t been awake for more than a few hours, fatigue flooded his body. Ancalagon huffed again. 

Mairon woke hours later to find that Ancalagon had had his feeding - and judging by the pile of bones had also eaten his feeder - and was fest asleep, every snore and earthquake that shook Mairon’s curled body. He got to his feet and incinerated the remains of the meal, then made his way back to the castle. 

Mairon did not wait for full recovery and it never came as he built back up what Melkor had broken. 

First the castle, brick by brick and with each passing day, it got easier. With one less Silmaril in his crown, Melkor’s return to apathy and paranoia seemed slowed enough to keep from spreading outside his body, but it was not halted and so, old patterns returned. 

Mairon carried the entire workload on his shoulders, preparing them for every eventuality and all who beheld his accomplishments looked to Melkor in amazement. When Angbang stood proudly once more, Mairon helped Gothmog with breeding and joined the Orcs in the forges. Not few of the swords they would wield were of his making and superior because of it.

All the while, he carried in his heart a pain that festered steadily and grew more intense as time crept on. Grew with the dragons and their feisty fire, grew with the numbers and strength of the Orcs, grew with Melkor’s mental absence. He did not let it keep him from work, nor from perfection.

And then, war was upon them once more. Time for Mairon to show that he was still worthy and that his work would bear fruits.


	3. A Century of Decay

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter three, enjoy :)
> 
> Warning: ample gore ahead, Mairon has some... symptoms haha

When the first battle horns of the Noldorin scum and their entourage rebounded off the surrounding mountainside, Mairon found himself in full armor and on his knees. Retching bile and half-digested meat onto the floor of the hall and in front of the collected commanding officers of their force, Gothmog at their helm. Orcs and Balrogs alike stared at him, wide-eyed. Dark spirits muttered behind their hands and vampires, hanging upside down from the ceiling, squeaked in arousal. A troll sneezed. 

“What is happening to me,” he said under his breath and none heard. None but Melkor who gripped him by the neck, squeezing, and hauled him back to his feet roughly. 

“Have you no control over your body?” he growled into Mairon’s ear, though the silence that had fallen over the crowd was so absolute that, surely, the sentiment had traveled even to the last pair of ears present.

“I beg your forgiveness.” Mairon barely got through the sentence before another bout of nausea had his stomach lurch. It was pure will power that prevented another bout of vomiting. Melkor released him, shoving him forward. Mairon stumbled a few steps, then righted himself and wiped at his mouth. His gauntlet caught on his chapped lips, tearing them. It came away speckled with blood.

“Attention my subjects,” Melkor roared, addressing the others. “A change of strategy is in order. The Lieutenant will remain in Angband and distribute our forces. You will use the vampires to run all tactical decisions through him. I want him him to have reports by the half hour. Anyone unclear on what their tasks are?” No one replied, no one dared to, and so, Melkor raised Grond high to the ceiling, casting a long shadow over Mairon. “To a glorious victory.” A roaring cheer roughened up Mairon’s headache and the other creatures present hoisted their weapons, jabbed them at the air.

As the commanders marched out of the hall to position their units for the plan Gothmog and Mairon had devised over many a candle, Melkor stayed behind. His back at Mairon as he spoke. 

“Be grateful that I am allowing you to partake at all. Get a grip on yourself, Mairon, next time I will not be this patient.”

“I do not know what is going-”

“Do not lie to me,” Melkor growled. The walls shook with his baritone. “I have watched you when you think yourself unnoticed. Gorging on mountains of meat which, if I may remind you, is meant to feed our army. Win this battle for me and treat whatever ails you. Before that, I do not want to see your face again.” With those words, Melkor strutted out of the hall, leaving Mairon alone to despair at the loss of control he still had no explanation for. It was true, he had craved meat like a beast, had succumbed to his urges and had ravished an entire store full. It had been raw and chewy and after, his jaw had ached, but his body had been satisfied. For a few hours at least. Then the vomiting had started. 

Before Mairon had slid into his armor and heeded the call to arms, he had made sure that his stomach was empty by forcing it to spill its contents. Unsuccessfully so, it seemed. 

Cramps still shuddered through his body when Mairon stepped onto the balcony of the Southern tower of Angband from whence he could see all the land that lay at her feet. He commanded a few vampires to his side who would carry the messages between the commanders and himself. Everything was set up to perfection. Immaculate ranks that soothed Mairon’s temper. Melkor was not among them, hidden in a dormant breeding cave or vacant dungeon cell as was his habit, but his lust for blood caused the clouds to form a rumbling swirl above the glazed field.

As it turned out, there was little for Mairon to do but watch on as their forces clashed with the Elves and Men that had dared to tread this far north in their challenge. From the first charge onward, Melkor’s forces had the upper hand. The Elves were furious, determined, reckless even and it became a matter of holding out until the enemy ran out of steam. Mairon itched all over with the burning desire to join the Orcs and Spirits and rage across the battle field. His was a wasted potential when he could have taken out the entire enemy force with a sweep of his mace. Give an outlet to the ache that was still lodged within him. Mairon did not. He stayed put, almost bored as the Elves’ will slowly faded.

There was one moment that, in hindsight, could have been called critical. It was three days into the battle when Melkor ordered to unleash the last reserves of their soldiers. As such it was a moment out of Mairon’s control and he watched with exasperation as Glaurung and two dozen of his children used that opportunity to buy themselves glory, and burst from the Western mountains. They attacked a host of Dwarfs, driving them back until Glaurung found himself surrounded, axes chipping away at his scales. The dragons were too young to fight yet and had to retreat back into Angband. 

Mairon could have foregone his orders and intervened, but he had no inclination to do so. Not when Glaurung had attacked in an act of open defiance of Melkor’s will, behavior that warranted neither aid nor praise. 

In the end, Gothmog and his host overwhelmed the Noldorin soldiers in a perfect execution of his and Mairon’s strategy. The Lord of Balrogs slew Fingon the Valiant and won the battle which would go down in history as the Battle of Unnumbered Tears. Not for Melkor and his forces though. Their Orcs raided Beleriand, their losses were insignificant. Melkor was immensely pleased, so much so that he had Mairon organize a feast. All of Angband gathered and celebrated, but Mairon could not rejoice.

Humiliation had settled into his bones, too deeply to make away with with such an easy win, and he was sick. Sick with the need of giving shape to his pains and frustrations. Not long after, they came out all of their own accord. 

Mairon could not tell how he gotten into the dungeons, who had ripped out the bars of the cell or why he was in such a state. Hands bare and bloodied, insides numb, hearing subdued, and his vision flecked with red. Mairon had no notion of the world around him either. No. He was reduced to one sentiment, he needed to get the itch out of his skin. Vaguely, he could make out bodies around him, backing up, blubbering screams on their lips, but he did not heed them and continued. Flame poured from his fingers as he jumped at the nearest form and sank his hand into it, hot blood embracing them. Mairon growled in pleasure as he tore and burned, tore and burned. His chest was beyond aching now, throbbing, about to explode and the brutal need to destroy overtook his conscious mind. 

Tears stung in the corners of his eyes and Mairon blinked them away, scratched at whatever came close to him. He was going to set the whole world on fire. 

“Mairon?” A voice, distant and fuzzy. It could not lift the haze and Mairon ignored it, spitting ashes at the body before him. Then, a sharp pain across his cheeks, black blotches replacing the red and for a sweet moment of reprieve: silence. Too soon, he came to, sprawled on the ground. Something cold and wet stuck to his face. Mairon blinked several times and rubbed at his chest, a habit by now, before heaving himself into a sitting position. His eyes widened and his stomach dropped.

Mairon sat, by himself, in the middle of a massacre. It was a cell were they kept prisoners of war, Elves mostly as Men wasted away too quickly to keep. It was dimly lit, but he could still make out the five or so bodies around him, ripped open from neck to navel, their rib-cages bent open, guts spilling out. The stone walls had been painted red and piles of intestines acted as decoration, sorted by organ. Some gave off curls of reeking smoke. Two Elves had their jaws torn off too, and Mairon clutched the hair of a separated head in his hand. He hurled it away and it landed with a splash among various body parts. Even for a scene in Melkor’s dungeons, this was gruesome. 

“What were you planning to do with them?” A cool voice said. Melkor leaned in the doorway, his arms crossed over his plated chest and half a smile twisting his face. Mairon blinked and no answer came to him. The sight before him did not appall him exactly. Bubbly confusion, like intoxication, coursed through his body and his stomach growled in hunger. It was unlike anything he had ever felt before and he did not appreciate it one bit.

“What is happening to me?” he asked weakly. 

“I could not say.” Melkor shrugged. “But it seems you are tired of cold Orc muck. Like them fresh, do you? I understand, of course, but well. You killed five of our most valuable hostages.” He raised an eyebrow and waded through the carnage to tower over Mairon.

“Come on,” he crooned and grabbed Mairon’s chin. “You enjoyed it. Slaughtering them like animals. Listening to their screams.” Memory peeked through the haze. Mairon watched himself break open these sodden creatures with his bare hands and he felt a surge of joy in his Feä. His fingers itched, but there was no one left to butcher, no one but… no one but Melkor. A hand closed around Mairon’s throat and Melkor bent down low, licking blood from his lips.

“Do not even consider it,” Melkor said. “It would be most unwise to treat me like them.”

“Of course,” Mairon said, but he was oh so hungry and he could hear the blood pulsating in Melkor’s veins. With another slap, Melkor set Mairon’s cheeks ablaze and tore him out of his trance. “What does mylord want with me anyway?”

“To speak with you. There have been news from Nargothrond.” 

“Glaurung?” Mairon asked and sucked in air as Melkor released him, wiping his hands on the tunic of one of the dead Elves. 

“Dead, slain by a Man of all creatures. It seems his reign was not blessed. Pitiful, but he was becoming a nuisance anyway. Too self-centered. Now, eat to your heart’s content and then clean up. I expect you in my chambers by nightfall.” 

“Understood.” Though what for, Mairon had no idea. Melkor’s moods were as unpredictable as Mairon’s own bodily reactions these days. No knowing what the new day would bring, only that it would be bleak. 

When Mairon was alone again, he hesitated, but his insides twisted and howled. He reached for the pile of livers and picked one up, took a tentative bite. The consistency and the taste of blood were hard to acclimate himself to, but once he swallowed, his hunger got so ferocious that he could not stop. Mairon ate, ate, and this time he did not throw up. 

When Melkor did take him that night, he almost felt well.

“Beren and Luthien have met their final ending,” Melkor announced once upon a council meeting, several months after Glaurung’s demise. This was beyond great news. Melkor’s forces controlled a huge part of Beleriand, Thingol had perished, Melian fled. And now, finally, brilliantly, the whore had died and taken her good-for-nothing pet with her. To be rid of Luthien meant that there were few left wandering Middle-Earth who could stand up to them. It would take the host of Valinor to challenge Melkor and Mairon knew how complacent his siblings had become over the past age. 

Joy overcame him. Mairon felt it first as a bubble deep in his stomach which swelled and swelled, pressed against the ache, until it burst out of his mouth as a harsh, loud laugh. Before he knew it he was hollering, clutching his stomach. The other attendees stared at him, but he could not stop, could barely gather enough strength to wipe at the tears that streamed down his cheeks. Somewhere, Mairon knew what a ridiculous figure he was making. This was no laughing matter. Not at all. 

To their credit, a couple of the Orcs present tried for a polite chuckle, punched each other in the shoulder, but the sounds died quickly when Melkor glared first at them and then at Mairon. He shook with laughter, stomach convulsing in pleasure, pain.

“Lieutenant,” Melkor said sharply and pressed a sharp fingernail into Mairon’s thigh under the table. “Pray tell, what is so funny?”

“It is just,” Mairon gasped, and pawed at his own face. “Who is left now to oppose us? What stands between us and total victory?”

“I would not be this hasty in your conclusions. My brother and his playmates are not entirely out of the equation, neither are Beren and Luthien. They have left a child.” Melkor folded his hands. 

The words sank in and the mood shift came as sudden as the laughter and equally, Mairon had no control over it. His cheeks flushed and heat spread to his limbs as he shot out of his seat, let his hand fall flat on the table with a resounding slap. 

“It is as I said, then. We should have ended her life a long time ago,” he growled and was met with confused blinking on the Orc’s part, a sigh full of sparks on Gothmog’s. “And who listened to me? Who considered my theories? No one.”

“Lieutenant,” Melkor said, voice dipping low, lower, danger. Mairon paid no heed. “Sit down please.”

“I will not. A THOUSAND TIMES I have told you to murder her. It would have been EASY for you. Like plucking a flower. Right? KING OF ALL THE WORLD?” Mairon’s throat protested against the screaming and spittle flew from his lips. Everyone stared at him now, including Melkor, with wide eye and open mouths. He was not done though. “You are BLINDED AND STUPEFIED and now we have another disaster of hers to deal with?” Mairon slapped the table again, his breath shuddering. “I am so DONE WITH ALL OF THIS.” With that, he turned on his heel and stalked out of the whole. Melkor let him and a sun cycle later it was as if the whole scene had not happened. Once more, Mairon was left by himself to marvel at the changes to him. Despaired at the inevitability of it all. He was almost tempted to pray to his father whom he had not dared to address in ages. Not that desperate yet though no. It was the deep dark he spoke to, the night around him, when he wished for it to be over and soon.

As Melkor’s forces stormed Gondolin, Mairon was confined to his bed, unable to do more than lift a finger. Even if Melkor had not banished him to his chambers, he would not have gotten out of bed, not without aid, and after his recent displays, no one was inclined to help him. Two weeks, he wasted away in the dark. Famine consumed him and he shook and shivered. Whenever the fever lifted enough so that Mairon could think, he found that there was no word from their forces, no visit by his master, and he could only guess at what was happening down South.

It should be a swift overwhelm what with the Elves waning themselves in safety in their hidden city. They would never guess that a spy was among them and now it was too late. Sometimes, Mairon smiled into the darkness as he imagined himself cleaving Turgon’s head off, crushing his sister’s nasty smile under his heels. Corrupting her son to become one of theirs.

To leave this accursed work to others once more ate at Mairon almost as much as the empty stomach did. The ache had him chew at the furs that covered him, but that only bruised his sensitive insides, made him cough for hours on end. 

When those two weeks had passed, Mairon thought he would meet his end. Nearly fifty years of this sickness and he had neither identified it, nor discovered a cure. But it was not so. He woke up to find the fever dissipated. 

When Melkor’s force returned, Mairon was on his feet again, fatigue shaken off and his heartache reduced to a soft pressure. He met them in the courtyard, Orc horns filling the bleak, toxic atmosphere, his master already in attendance, crawled out of his hole below the stronghold. Victory was written into Melkor’s straight spine and proud chin, his arrogant sneer even though Gothmog had fallen and he himself had not lifted a finger to bring about their dominion 

“The Final Battle will be upon us soon,” Melkor said, hammering a spotless Grond into the ground, and the Orcs cheered. “The air reeks of it.”

“We will be ready,” Mairon answered, breathless and rubbing his chest. 


	4. A War of Wrath

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoy :)
> 
> Warning: As this chapter mainly concerns itself with a certain war we don't like to talk about, there will be some very graphic violence and gore.

All that Mairon had feared and hoped against hope would not happen, came to pass. It was due to action of Luthien’s accursed offspring and their spouse that all Valinor was swayed to take up arms once more. To move against Melkor whom they called Morgoth. It was a name Mairon both revered and despised for several reasons. It befit all that Melkor had accomplished and all that was his vision, but it was noxious too. They had given it to him and that in itself was unacceptable. No matter now though, Mairon would have ample time to chew on it when the war was won. If the war was won. 

The stampeding of the Valar’s horses echoed through the now desolated corridors of Angband before a single enemy was in sight and Mairon had difficulty to stay still. His whole body trembled even though he thought himself prepared for every eventuality, even though this was the pinnacle of all he had labored towards for many a century, even though he was convinced that the day would be theirs. Adrenaline had invaded his bloodstream in unhealthy amounts from the moment the first messengers had reported the journey of the Valar had begun. He would finally have his fight and then, this would all be over. Melkor would have his kingdom and the rest of their lives would be cast in soot and darkness. Blessed darkness. Peace. 

In the courtyard, Angband’s Balrogs had gathered to sharpen their swords and polish their hammers. The Orcs were arranged by the battalion and formed neat blocks outside the castle’s perimeter. Equal troupes were positioned to the South-east to lead another charge once the battle was in full swing. Gothmog’s absence was painfully obvious in the Balrog’s hunched shoulders, and their rough demeanor as they failed to line up for a final inspection by their commander. They opted to shove at each other and spit vile curses instead. Gothmog would have had them ready for battle hours ago. 

Additionally, the vampires and younger drakes circled over Beleriand, out of sight, but not out of control, to wait for their enemies. An army of turncoat Men marched with the troops of the Valar, disguised as part of their ranks to create a clutch point. Inch by inch, they meant to close in on the Holy Host, surround the Elves and their Gods until there was nowhere left to turn but Mandos. Everything and everyone was - more or less - exactly where they should be except for Melkor and Mairon. They occupied the balcony of the Southern tower once more, scrutinizing their army who waited for their commands. 

“The day is upon us,” Mairon said and pulled his gauntlets over his shaking hands. “All our struggles have come to this.” 

“A word of warning,” Melkor replied. Mairon glanced up and found his master staring at him instead of the sea of monsters below them. His charred hands were bare and the look in his eyes had Mairon spiral backward in time, flashes of that night after the disaster with the Silmaril -its siblings illuminated Melkor’s ashen face still- heating his cheeks. The tenderness he had thought withered, had attributed to his own twisted perception of the world, was there now. The lines of Melkor’s face had smoothed out, set his pink-gray scars into relief. His fingers lifted to rest against Mairon’s cheek, one thumb caressing it as though they had all the time on Arda to savor this moment. As if the horses of the Valar were not passing into their realm this very moment. Mairon let himself take a breath that struggled against the weight in his chest. Let himself close his eyes. 

“Mairon, listen to me. There will come a day when you and I are parted and it will seem like the end of the world. It will be, in a way. Everything will change, but that is not a bad thing. It will be a new beginning for us and our vision. Do you believe me?” 

“Yes,” Mairon said. His heartbeat drowned out the insults of the Balrogs below, the rattling of armor as the Orcs grew restless, the yapping howls of the Wolves who were out for blood. He had no idea where Melkor was going with this, not with total victory a hairbreadth away, but Melkor’s words were so urgent, so determined, that Mairon had to agree. Against the strange tug he felt at his insides. 

“You have to promise me to keep fighting. No matter what. If you lose trust in all else, trust in me. In us. Can you do that? Have faith?”

“Always.”

Dry lips pressed against Mairon’s and he melted into them, the warmth of their touch enough to eradicate all else. One last taste of this, the only thing he had ever truly loved. One last kiss to wipe away a century of suffering. One last acknowledgment that they were more than a master and his servant. 

Too soon, the contact was broken and Melkor gone from his side. Disappeared to his rabbit hole where he would wait out the battle, put his fate into the hands of other, lesser creatures. It was all on Mairon now. 

As if on cue, their strategy unfolded in his head to fill the emptiness Melkor had left behind, to keep out the dread that brewed in the depth of his Feä. To be parted from Melkor a third time was unfathomable and with his sickness and everything else considered, Mairon did not think he would manage it. He had to trust. Trust and fight.

A horn boomed though the valley, so loud it rattled the bricks of the castle and the Balrogs finally quieted, the Orcs returned to attention. Mairon hopped over the railing and landed in the middle of four blocks of soldiers, dust swirling up around him. He raised his weapon without a word and thousands of Orcs here, nearly as many in the shadow of the Misty Mountains, all the world’s Balrogs, some three-thousand Men, and one forsaken Vala in his cave did the same. 

“To battle,” Mairon said and though he spoke quietly, his voice carried to all those who were meant to hear. His muscles were steel as he held the weapon up high, as the first host of Valinor appeared on the horizon. A grand army of golden-haired Elves who sang in high-pitched voices as they approached the army of Orcs, their unspoiled armor the same shade as their hair and the swords they held at their breasts.

“TO BATTLE,” came the roaring reply, like thunder, like the ocean, like the end of all things. Mairon charged, all thought besides bloodshed and victory suspended. Time for their last stand.

By nightfall on the second day, the land they clashed on was drenched in rivers of blood and grime, bodies piling up by the thousands, and the Elves showed the first signs of weariness. Mairon could not remember a time when his hands had not been clamped around the iron rod of his mace, the fifth one now. The first four had been beaten beyond recognition, dulled by bone and armor. 

The mud on his face could not dry ere it was spattered anew, his wounds could not close ere they were torn open by yet another sword, arrow, ax, dagger. It was infinite. And yet, side by side with the Orcs, leading them into new formations when they scattered and uplifting their spirits, Mairon was sure they could deal the fatal blow soon. Curiously, no Vala had shown their face this close to Angband yet, and the scattered reports Mairon received indicated that they were, all of them, engaged down south with their second army. The Balrogs had disappeared to somewhere in between to keep enemy reinforcements from coming either way and to fight some of the stronger Maiar. It was only a matter of time though before the Valar realized that the Vanyar were in dire need of their help or they would all perish at Mairon’s hands. If this was all of them that was.

Mairon grinned, drawing heavy, puffy breaths as the temperature had dropped rapidly with sundown. He grabbed the nearest head he could reach and used his powers to burn the Elf’s eyes out, liquefy his brains. As the body crumpled, smoldering still, Mairon mused. There was one weapon they had held back, leashed closely. A reserve for the last stretch when the foot soldiers were out of the equation and it came down to force of will. Mairon thought he could use them more effectively now though. 

_Melkor_ , he screamed inwardly as he tried to reach his master over the soil and rock that separated them, over the clashing and screaming and thousands of conscious minds that acted as interfering static. He dodged the blade of a rusty Vanyar princess and smashed her head in with his mace, calling again and again until something tugged at his eardrums.

_Speak._

_Let me free Ancalagon. He will lead the Dragons in a great assault. Burn all that oppose us here so we may join the clashes down South. It would be child’s play._

_It is not yet time._

_He is stronger than you give him credit for. I have thought this through, master, he will last._

A stretch of silence followed and Mairon fell back into the haze of battle, weapon swinging, fire bursting from him in all direction and he had lost body count once more when Melkor replied.

_Do it._

Mairon bared his teeth as a tall warrior approached him with a morning star like a pendulum, fearlessness written into the hard set of his dirt-speckled mouth.

“Come and get me,” Mairon beckoned and dropped his weapon, arms open wide. Little bursts of flame sprouted form his finger tips, but he moved not. The Elf needed no further invitation and charged. “Foolish child.” Ere the morning star could graze him, Mairon transformed, making the Vanyar give a startled yelp and look around himself. Up at where Mairon hovered. “Got you.” And he dived onto the Elf’s face, tore it open with sharp claws. Screams subsided to whimpers and at last, Mairon sunk his talon’s into a meaty throat and flew off, dragging the body through the air until skin and sinew broke and what remained of the Elf plummeted to the sullied earth. Screams like music filled Mairon’s ears and he could taste the honey despair, the saccharine exhaustion woven through them. This was the right move. 

Mairon soared past the leagues of battlefield, past the towers of Angband and the peaks of the Thangorodrim, carrying an ever-swelling wave of heat before him which, when he finally reached them, blasted away the iron rods that held Ancalagon captive. The Dragon peeked his head out of the cave, sniffling at the cold air and blinking against the light, so unused to being out in the open. When he spotted Mairon above, he inclined his head and waited, eyes sharp. 

“Gather your siblings,” Mairon said. “It is time for you to go to war. Ancalagon opened his maw and spat out a great spire of flame, high into the skies so that the mountains around them were basked in orange, rivers of icy water running down their sides. Then, he crawled out of his caves, wings unfurling for the first time in forever. When Ancalagon took to the air, each flap created a gust strong enough that Mairon was thrown backward. He worked against the current, watched as Ancalagon uttered a mute cry and from caves and crevices around them, Dragons of all sizes emerged, gathering by Ancalagon’s head. All in all, there were no more than two dozen, some as big as a mountain, some barely taller than Mairon, but as one force they would rain doom upon the world. Charring it with the inferno that simmered in their chests. Ancalagon let loose another pillar of flame, a battle cry, and the Dragons charged toward the battle field. 

Mairon smiled and took off too, leaving this part of land for the Dragons to destroy. His path took him South, to organize and command their second army and the Men, but ere he could reach their fighting grounds, something below held him up. He descended over the battle field near the ruins of Gondolin where the Balrogs were scattered, fighting Elves and Maiar alike. From high up, Mairon could see that they were failing, driven back by large spears and crossbows, the glowing swords of Valinor that seemed infused with the light of the Trees even after all these years. A Balrog’s hammer clashed with a broadsword that rung with a song Mairon knew all to well. Melian had returned to Middle-Earth one last time. 

The Balrog was forced back, trampling a few Elves and running over another Balrog. Before Melian could drive the blade home, Mairon landed between them, transformed, and blocked her mid-air with a sword he summoned to him from the littered ground. It was a silver blade, made from Gondolin steel, and it shivered under Melian’s force, but withstood with ease. 

“Oh look,” Melian hissed through gritted teeth. “Morgoth’s lap-dog.”

“Oh look,” Mairon echoed with a smirk. “My sister with the Elf-kink, too bad he bit the dust. By Dwarfen hands no less.” Melian roared and dove head-first at him, vines shooting from her body, and Mairon answered with his own powers, burning away what grew at her demand while their swords clashed again, and again, ringing over the battle field. Around Mairon, the Balrogs ramped up, rejuvenated by their master’s presence and he barked out commands to them, organizing them into a formation. Their commander had fallen and the Demons had had not direction, but now they held back the host of Sindar that flooded them at Melian’s orders. She was still their queen, Mairon supposed, but not for long. 

The pain in his chest was louder than hers, was more desperate and he used that to focus himself, out-maneuver his sister. At once, he shut off his powers which had her stumble with the force of her own and he used that split-second of missed balance to drive his weapon into her chest. She did not scream, but spat at him, lips bloody red. The skin around Mairon’s sword pushed to mend back together. Channeling his Feä in his arms, Mairon twisted the sword in her chest, causing her to scream in agony. 

“What has become of you,” Melian gasped, but the words barely registered with Mairon. He braced himself against the ground, pushing his weapon until it was buried to the hilt in her body and they came nose to nose. 

“You disgust me.” Mairon jumped, threw his whole weight at the blade and pushed it down, splitting her lower half in two, destroying her cursed womb. For the time being. Enough to give him satisfaction. Organs she did not need spilled from her body. She bled like a pig, screamed herself hoarse. In a few minutes, her body would be healed, stores of her power depleted to restore what Mairon had destroyed, but he could hang on to the memory he had created of her. Melian, broken. Melian, curled on the ground. Melian, cursing his name. 

Mairon grinned and swung his grimy sword over his shoulders.

“See you in hell, sister,” he said and turned to go, but his feet were rooted to the ground. A small growth of trees had sprouted around his boots and kept him in place. Mairon craned his neck and spotted Aiwendil, small, strange, stupid Aiwendil crouch by Melian’s side, his hand stretched out. Mairon cackled.

“This is adorable.” With a wave of his fingers, he burned the trees and started towards Aiwendil, meaning to mutilate him twice as badly as Melian, meaning to scoop his trusting brown eyes out of his skull, but then he noticed a great shadow in the distance, black wings carrying whirlwinds before them.

“Ancalagon,” Mairon murmured. It seemed the dragon had excelled beyond his expectations and had finished the Northern skirmishes in a sweep of doom. As the Dragon neared, however, Mairon flinched. He was flying low, too low. Came tumbling down. Ancalagon’s eyes came into view at last and they were golden no more, the soul within extinguished. The Dragon pivoted in the air, hung suspended for a long breath before he plummeted, an intricate web of silver-gold enclosing him. A single, bright dagger protruded from Ancalagon’s skull, looking to be made form starlight. All of Beleriand vibrated and shattered as the Dragon hit the ground, burying thousands of bodies underneath and cheers of joy erupted from the surrounding Elves and Spirits. Cries of agony from the Balrogs who were scattered once more at the Dragon’s fall. The first Balrog was slain then and many more followed suit, the defeat of Melkor’s weapons rejuvenating the weakened armies of Valinor. 

“No,” Mairon screamed and sank to his knees. “NO!” If Ancalagon had fallen, none of their other Dragons would stand a chance. Mairon called out for his master, but Melkor had warded himself off from all communications. Was this the end that he had foretold then? Was this their defeat? No.

Mairon growled, his chest pulsating, and got back up. But before he could devise a new strategy, think his way out of this disaster, the ground under him gave way. An earthquake had his teeth chatter, his armor rattle. An earthquake as though the whole continent was breaking apart, sinking into the sea. Mairon could not scream. Could not move. A rock hit him across the temple and all the world went black.

Mairon awoke to a harsh wind that whipped his cheeks, tried to split him apart as he was carried through the air, embraced by claws. Red wings spanned to either side of him and beyond them, the open sky, dim and gray in the wake of the greatest battle the world had ever seen. Flakes of ash fell like snow around Mairon and caught in his hair, on his dry lips. He squinted up at the Dragon that carried him, whether to was unclear. He knew him not and was too weak to resist or wonder at what was happening. All had been lost at Ancalagon’s demise. It seemed impossible. Such a mighty beast, so easily overwhelmed. Their vision, shattered. All, lost. 

Mairon knew not of Melkor’s fate, but he was too much of a realist to assume that the Valar would grant him another second chance. When he reached out for his master, Mairon was met with an uncomfortable static between his ears which left one, heart-breaking conclusion to be drawn: Melkor had been thrust from Eä. Back to the void where Mairon had not the slightest chance of reaching him. 

He let his head loll back and embraced the harsh pain of the wind, the cold night. Sunrise was far off and exhaustion stark in every cell of his body. His muscles ached from the fight, his head throbbed from the impact and his heart felt as though infinite shards of glass were puncturing it. And all throughout, his chest ached. Mairon closed his eyes, let himself fall into the raw, clawing despair.

They touched down sometime later in a tiny valley that was littered with bleak rocks. The air was less dusty here, but bitingly cold. The Dragon gently laid him down, then arranged himself on a pale of stone, towering over Mairon’s beaten form. Mairon contemplated not rising, but he shook with shock, cold, pain, and the Dragon eyed him curiously.

“I have carried you here safely and now I must inquire after your name, mylord,” the Dragon said and extended a claw to help Mairon get to his feet.

“They call me Sauron.”

“A befitting name. I saw your effort on the battlefield, you burn beautifully.”

“I thank you. And who are you?” Mairon asked, passing his hand over the Dragon’s side which bled heavily. Not few scales hung on by slithers of muscle underneath, but they mended under Mairon’s touch, weakened though they both were, and the Dragon purred in pleasure as the surface of his body glittered in the first rays of morning’s light. Mairon felt drained after, harsh nausea gnawing at his insides, but he kept to his feet and when he came face to face with the Dragon once more, they both grinned. 

“The call me the Golden,” he said smugly, pushing out his chest. “But I am known to most as Smaug.”

“They? You are not one of ours?”

Smaug’s grin broadened, exposing a range of needle-sharp teeth, and Mairon thought of Ancalagon with weary sadness. The spirit that danced in Smaug’s eyes was of the same kin. Though Smaug was notably smaller as his chin could rest comfortably on Mairon’s palm when he reached out the scratch the Dragon. Hot steam puffed from Smaug’s nostrils and blew back Mairon’s muddied hair.

“I am not, though if you keep doing that, I might be swayed to change my mind.” Smaug’s wings fluttered. All Dragons had at one point spawned at Melkor’s will, so this was only partly true, but Mairon supposed the horde had gotten so large near the end that a few must have slipped away without their noticing. The end. Mairon closed his eyes as another wave of fresh grief crashed over him. He tasted salt.

“You were bound to fail, of course,” Smaug said, cocking his head. The lump in Mairon’s throat thickened and breathing became unbearable.

“Why did you save me, Smaug?”

“I was paid to do so.”

“By whom?”

“Me,” a new voice said and Mairon whipped around to see a figure emerge between two rocks. It was his brother, Eönwë, his skin patched with dirt and his long silver locks bound back, streaked through with black Orc blood. He was clad in his uniform, bearing the crest of the Lord of the Eagles upon his breast and face. He held a silver spear off which hung a tattered and grimy banner, and an equally silver horn dangled from his belt. Eönwë turned to Smaug and bowed. “Consider our contract fulfilled.”

Smaug nodded and rose, wings flapping. Before he took flight, he addressed Mairon once more.

“You carry great burden,” he hissed and tapped a sharp talon at Mairon’s chest. “Be rid of it ere it eats you whole.”

“What do you meant?” But no more. Smaug soared high and was soon swallowed by the layer of ash and dust that hid the sun and sky.

“Mairon,” Eönwë said and held up his free hand, using the other to lay down his weapon. “My brother.” Mairon fell into Eönwë’s arms as they invited him, as though they had not spent the last ages fighting one another. Eönwë hummed softly under his breath as he cradled Mairon’s head against his shoulder and that was it. The dam burst. 

It was a song Mairon remembered well, an alteration of Eru’s themes and one that had touched him most deeply back when things had been simpler. Long-drawn, low-pitched notes to accompany his wailing and as he shook and sobbed against Eönwë’s chest, his brother held him, singing. As he did so, a warm breeze embraced them and carried off the dirt and blood that clung to their bodies, knitted together the cuts on Mairon’s arms, mended his shattered armor and ripped breeches. Before he knew it, his body was whole, but that meant nothing to his shattered Feä. The pain in his chest was worse than ever and it stabbed at his heart in short intervals. A stab with every breath he drew, a jab with every sob he released.

“My darling little brother,” Eönwë said again after some time with no end to Mairon’s breakdown in sight, nothing to stop the tears. “I came to absolve you.” 

Mairon leaned back at the undertone in Eönwë’s voice, cold and full of sorrow at the same time. Tears pooled in the corners of those vivid, dark eyes. 

“No,” he said, breathless. And then louder: “Please, no. There is no need for this, I will not cause any more trouble, I promise.” Mairon’s eyes darted around them, searching the dusty rock for something, anything that might aid him. He was broken and outmatched and if Eönwë was there to end his life it was at the Valar’s and thus at his father’s command. Mairon would die, surrendering what little memory of his master was left on this world. He could not let that happen.

“Your crimes are horrendous, innumerable. You have damaged much in the name of Morgoth and have forsaken all that is holy to Eru and his schemes. You cannot deny it.” 

“I cannot. But I am remorseful.”

“If you come with me and renounce all your deeds, renounce your loyalties to Morgoth before my master and the other thirteen, there might be a life for you. I will vouch for you, other might not be so forgiving.” 

“I cannot do that, you know I cannot. I am bound to him, Eönwë. Bound by oaths greater than any promises you could make me. No matter how horrible my actions, no matter how much regret I harbor, nothing could sever the ties between us. I am his. I will always be his.” 

Eönwe’s forehead worked, confusion ghosting over his features. He could not comprehend for while the Ainur understood love, had capacity for it, they would never grasp the utter devotion necessary to follow a being such as Melkor. Would never understand what it meant to give up oneself wholly and never look back. Eönwë settled for a scowl and Mairon pushed his chin out.

“Face your punishment and repent,” Eönwë said. “Or die at my hands.”

“Can you not let me go? I have escaped the darkness, I swear it. Melkor is gone and with him all my ambition. Will you not be merciful, brother?”

“Please. Whither will you go? In your state-”

“My state?” Mairon cut in, and stepped back from his brother’s warmth, rubbing his own chest. “What do you speak of? Do you know of this sickness?”

“Sickness? Has he not told you?”

“Who? Told me what?” Mairon’s lips quivered at he pawed at his breastplate, fingertips sparking. He had half a mind to melt it away, trade the precious metal for a fraction of release on that pain. But more than that, he needed guidance. 

Trust in me, Melkor had said, but it seemed impossible. With death upon him, no matter the vesture he wore, and all Mairon burned for out of reach. If that had not been woe enough, everyone but him knew more of his ailments than he had been able to deduce. 

“Oh Mairon, I am so sorry.” Eönwë reached out and let his fingertips graze Mairon’s jaw, pushed back a strand of hair that was plastered to his sweaty forehead. “I always believed that there was a part of my brother left in you and I can see him plainly now. Go, before I change my mind. Hide yourself and if Eru is generous, you might make it.”

“Eönwë-”

“GO.”

Mairon flinched when Eönwë summoned his spear to his outstretched hand. The wind picked up, whipping the banner left to right. More on instinct than anything else, Mairon transformed into his vampire form one final time and flapped frantically. Whither to indeed? 


	5. A Birth of Spirits

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We've finally reached this rather traumatic event haha. Hope you enjoy it nonetheless!
> 
> Warning: gore and decay ahead

Mairon flew for three days and nights straight, always eastward. Whether Eönwe’s sharp words, his own mounting fears, or the painful stab of hopelessness, something drove him one, as far away from the Blessed Realm as physically possible. He found mountains there, a range that clustered all but forgotten at the edge of the world, their flanks covered in rolling fields of daisy-speckled grass, their caps wrapped in snow like cotton. Mairon landed by a babbling waterfall and deployed what was left of his strength into the rock. Much smoother here where the sun caressed the earth. A bird of prey shrieked overhead. 

“Come on,” Mairon panted, pushing his palms harder against the surface. The stone dissolved under his heated palms and with shaking knees, Mairon carved a cave into the mountainside, deeper and deeper until he could feel the heat of Arda’s core waft at him through the remaining layers of minerals. There, he turned back and beckoned the mountain to enclose him. The tunnel caved in with rolling thunder and Mairon was cast in absolute darkness. He summoned a small light, removed his armor, bit by painstaking bit, and then he lay down. His cheek cushioned on his bicep, Mairon prayed that he had hidden himself well enough.

It felt like he had hardly rested when he came to, choking on a mouthful of thick slime. It tasted faintly of the decaying evil that used to fester between the walls of Utumno, like sulfur and burnt flesh. When he spat it out it was black and fleshed with ash. Mairon retched into the dirt until his insides felt hollow, and raw, and wanted desperately to wash away the taste with a sip of water, but he had not the energy to sit up nor to conjure it. With that in mind, there was no realm in which he would have been able to leave the cave and scout out the nearest river or lake. Not with his bones turned to lava and his chest rumbling. Now to wait for the eruption. 

Mairon had no way to gauge time as he lay there, nor could he tell whether he was caught in a nightmare or, worse, chained to reality. For brief intervals, Mairon counted the minutes, out loud or in his head when his lungs grew too weak from the coughing, the heat that consumed him from the inside. He never managed more than ten or so before he would slip into an uneasy slumber and time would evade him once more. 

Now and again, pain as sharp as lighting whizzed through his chest and he was reminded of a vision Melkor had once shared with him. A land veiled in shadow where the mountains spewed fire and dark creatures flapped their wings, drank up the toxic atmosphere. The ground there was lifeless, cracked and bleak, and all mortal men who treaded upon it either perished, their minds raped and insides coated with poisonous fumes, or succumbed to this hell and became its servant. That was the world Mairon had worked all his life for and now he had found it, though by accident more than virtue. It lived inside of him and not he inside of it, and that was all wrong.

There was no glory to be had when he could not look upon it, could not bask in its fiery glow and call it Melkor’s legacy. Even if Mairon had been the only constant Melkor had owned, the only possession not to flee or fail him, he was but one soul. Never enough, not for a King. 

So, his thoughts spiraled as his body gradually decayed. 

Once, Mairon ached to venture out of his cave. For though he had been made a creature of darkness, he missed the glow of Laurelin’s fruit to kiss his cheeks. Too long had he dwelled in stone and shadow, deprived of light and input so that he felt his sharp intelligence wither. But his muscles had already fallen victim to the desolation inside of him. Mairon sighed and sucked the blood off his own cracked lips, pretending it was crystalline water and that the hot tears that stained his cheeks were a caress of sunlight. That he creaky whisper of the stiff fabric of his garments against his skin was the touch of his master, come back to comfort him.

Then followed sweet oblivion and for a period of time undefinable, he thrashed on the hard earth with naught to cushion him but his own swollen flesh and dreams of Melkor’s glory days which had passed so violently. Had slipped away under the guise of a new dawn for the world. 

The next time Mairon awoke was to a gust of wind that made his fingers twitch. He was not alone anymore, but he could not open his eyes either. They had been seared shut, lids molten unto the skin below. Remnants of heat lingered there, trapped against his eyes, blinding him. Mairon groaned and fell to his back, hands pressed flat to the ache which took all of his upper body now. Soon enough, voices drifted down the long-winding passages of the cave. Someone had opened it. Someone had found him.

“Mylord Manwë, what is your purpose,” came the first discernible sentiment in Eönwë’s chirruping tenor. Anger briefly reddened Mairon’s white-washed vision at the mention of that accursed name. An expression of a hatred Melkor had drilled so deeply into his subjects that it had become a visceral reaction. 

“I told you to stay away, Eönwë. This is none of your business,” Manwë replied, words as smooth as the windless sea. 

“It is my business. You tasked me with his surveillance, you need not interfere. Mylord.” 

They approached, not footsteps exactly, but air that curled against the ground and Mairon could feel it vibrate under his sensitive body. It stopped abruptly and something nudged his foot. A shadow fell over Mairon and he strained to keep still, keep his breathing as if in sleep. 

“The love you still harbor for him is misplaced and unjustified, but if you must know, I am here to end him. As he rightly deserves,” Manwë proclaimed with an air of finality. Grating whistles filled the cave, lifted Mairon’s dusty hair. And why not let it happen, he thought wearily. To perish at Manwë’s hand would be shameful, but not more testing than his continued existence without a sliver of hope that Melkor might return. Mairon was truly lost and all by himself and this would simply be another item in his collection of shortcomings. If only Melkor had one last ace up his sleeve, one more attempt at saving Mairon from the wrath of the Valar. It was another who advocated for Mairon.

“There is no need for that, surely,” Eönwë cried out, and Mairon could see the pale blush high on his cheeks in his mind’s eye. “He is barely alive as it is, do you not think his suffering is more than enough penance? More even than death would spell?”

“No, I do not, and even if I did, there is more to the matter than penance. He is a threat. What festers inside of him might very well enable Morgoth’s return. Your words ring treacherous, Maia.”

“Mylord, I beg you. Take one look at him and tell me his demise is not close at hand. His skin is blackened, his bones push hard against it. He is but a phantom.”

“Yet from the inside, he burns on. We cannot let this thing come to light, nor Sauron recover. The risk is too great.”

“It will kill him before it comes to that.”

“Better to be sure.”

“I am sure,” Eönwë pressed, and Mairon wished he could see his face, one last time. Its soft planes and slanted nose, the blazing eyes that had held him captive so long ago. Maybe all the answers he craved would be written into his brother’s creased forehead or the tell-tale fists that hung at his side. Or maybe they were hidden in the whispers that bounced along the breeze that surrounded Manwë wherever he treaded. Maybe, if Mairon opened his eyes, he would read the name of his doom in the waves of Manwë’s rustling white hair or in the starlight upon his brow. 

Mairon bit his tongue as his side flared up, a pain as though someone bit into his flank and tore chunks of flesh out. A scream hovered on the edge between his throat and mouth, and he swallowed around it. It did not burst forth, but pushed until his lips quivered so violently, it had to be visible from the outside. No such luck.

“I trust you Eönwë, but I am your Lord and King and you should not question my word,” Manwë said.

Will you not release me, Mairon begged silently. Something tickled his lung tissue. Wanted him to cry out. But confrontation was not on his mind. He wanted silent death.

“Would I be a good servant in following you blindly? Is it not my privilege to make you a better king? Have mercy, mylord, I beg of you. Do not sully your hands with blood that is already spilled.”

“If he returns…”

“He will not,” Eönwë said, steadfast, sure. Mairon thanked his brother in silence. He wanted silent death, yes. But more than that he wanted certain death.

“I trust you,” Manwë repeated and no more was said between them, quelling any hopes of further revelation. 

Once they were gone, the air back to stifling, Mairon’s muscles tightened, convulsed from laying still so long and he shot up into a seated position. His eyes bulged and broke out of their prison as he finally released the itch in his throat. Spiraling flakes of ashes burst from his mouth with every cough and filled up the cave. They hung briefly suspended in the air, and for a split second it was not at all like staring into a cave full of ash. It was as though Mairon stared into Melkor’s eyes, full of chaos and darkness and bittersweet promise. 

Not much longer now. 

As if Melkor was reaching out from the void, straight into Mairon’s heart. 

Hold on. 

The ashes flurried back into motion and the vision dissipated. Mairon wiped his dry mouth.

“For what?” he asked, voice coarse from misuse and abuse. There was no reply. He slumped back down and waited. Held on against his own feral need for his existence to be over. Held on. 

“Stop,” Mairon said to himself, to the mountain that held him tight in its cradle, to the simmering, constant, unbearable ache in his chest. His was an existence of suffering, continuous the way Melkor had meant for the Children to endure under his tyranny, inescapable the way Mairon had gravitated towards the shadows even back in Aulë’s domain, iron-wrought like the phantom-mace his fingers curled around in fevered dreams of the last battle. Every breath he drew, fire scraped at his airways, turned the skin barren. “Please, stop.” Less than a whisper now. Sparks cascaded from his lips, singeing his jaw, the desiccated slope of his neck. 

He had reached a conclusion at last and though it was unscientific in that it lacked coherent thought and objective data points, it seemed the only logical one left. His Feä had been corrupted and now it ate him alive. Mairon was able to accept that, more effortlessly than the exile of his master, but he wished for the process to accelerate. Once more, a swift death was on his mind and with the Valar out of the equation, there remained but one remedy.

In moments of clarity, Mairon exerted himself, incinerated the stone around him so that his powers worked harder to devour him, inside and out. Sometimes the cave lit up like a Balrog’s chest, sometimes he was unable to produce more than a faint glow from his finger tips. Always, the flames shied away from him. 

The rest of the time he spent thrashing in his continuous fever. The fire in his chest spread and charred while a shiver nested against his skin, leaving him in a perpetual state of freezing.

Fire and ice abused Mairon’s body as their battlefield, waging a sempiternal war. Mairon cried, he bellowed into nothingness, he laughed himself hoarse, ribs cracking under the pressure of the movement, but mostly he wondered how Melkor had stood it. The agony of chaos was unbearable, especially to one who used to call focus and order his most valued gift. He had spread it with ease, yes, but to contain it in his mortal vessel would end him. 

And the end came. 

The end came in the guise of a noise like parchment being torn in two. Mairon, on his back, cracked his eyes open, sensible to any stimulus though they had become, and found that his chest had opened up, gaping. Dry, black skin peeled away from the abyss, curling outward, bits of string stuck to it which signified the sodden remains of Mairon’s tunic. The rest had evaporated a long time ago.

Mairon gurgled and sucked on the inside of his cheeks which he had bitten raw. Fresh blood moistened his sandpaper throat and he drank it greedily. He had to be conscious now, sane enough for this historic event. The death of a Maia, the first to the extent of his knowledge. Per legend, even Balrogs had halls where their dead rested, but Mairon doubted that he would be bequeathed with an afterlife. No matter the circumstance of his end. 

He watched, agape, as the hole widened. His ribs faded to dust, revealing what they had held caged all these years. It should not have come as a surprise, but Mairon still flinched as he saw that his chest was filled with giant flakes of ash, woven through with withered skin and dark patches of sludge. The remnants of his internal organs. 

Mairon made to rest his strained neck, close his aching eyes, but something stopped him. A faint glow seeped through the ashes, illuminating the cave and sucking out all light at the same time. The resulting phenomenon had the darkness warp and twist all around Mairon, straining against the laws of physics. Mairon blinked and as he sucked another rattling breath into vaporized lungs, the ashes parted to reveal a flickering, black flame. It sat right where Mairon’s Feä should be, yet he could feel it as something separate from himself. He squinted to find flecks of orange among the wavering gloom. A virus then. Not corruption, nor weakness. A virus had taken him. 

The realization made of his death wish a symptom and he almost wanted to laugh. What a decrepit fool he had been. What a waste of space. 

“Enough.” Mairon’s mouth shaped the word soundlessly, but it sufficed. Thunder crashed in his ears and a sharp pain tore through him, but he bit down on it rather than let it consume him. He was not going to succumb to this. With gritted teeth, Mairon stared at the black fire and willed it to leave his body. Sweat broke across his temples and he heaved until it felt like he was physically pushing the virus out. When the flame slipped free, slipped out of Mairon’s body and stayed there, a foot or so above the hole it had been born from, the noise died.

Mairon panted, sucking in air and his Feä, now free of the parasite, flared up in a high column, then burst outward. It cleansed Mairon’s body in one sweep and basked the rock around him in scarlet light. His ribs rose from the ashes and rebuilt themselves, the contents of his chest melted into functioning organs and as soft, pale skin wove over them, Mairon’s heart took its first tentative beat in years. 

And then a second. 

On the third beat, Mairon was on his feet, leaving the cave, the flame, the suffering behind as he worked his fresh muscles to propel himself forward. The stone bowed before him and opened into a passage. Mairon reached the mouth of the cave in seconds and as he stepped out of it, naked and rejuvenated, relief flooded him. If this had been a test, he had passed, no matter its true nature. He had no inclination to stay and find out. Mairon walked away. 

I am unchain, part of him cried out in bliss, doing somersaults in his stomach. He let it, for a bit, and felt the moist grass under his bare feet. Rays of sunlight embraced him like a long lost lover and he relished the cold mountain air that filled his lungs. Relished even the breeze that raked across his skin and left behind a trail of goosebumps. He was a part of this world as much as any Elf or Man and as such, he could appreciate it as an image of before. Before the eternal night that was yet to come. 

There it was then, the long-standing truth, the entire foundation of Mairon’s being since he had broken out of Eru’s pretty prison. The reason he would never be free to simply wander and bask and be thankful to be alive. 

A thousand oaths Mairon had sworn, some spoken, some written in blood or rooted deep within the earth, but all of them amounting to the same thing. His purpose. To transform the world according to Melkor’s gospel. There was no breaking his fealty and now that his mind was clear once more, Mairon’s focus returned with a vengeance. 

Melkor might be gone, might have even planted this virus, submitting Mairon to the worst torture anyone had endured at his hands yet, but the future he had conceived was etched into Mairon’s every thought. It quelled the prancing part of him that had the delusion of free will.

Mairon walked on until, at last, he happened upon a river. The separation from the parasite had healed his body from the inside, but outwardly he was filthy. Blood and earth formed a crust over his skin, ash clung to his hair which hung in dead chunks off his scalp. Without hesitation, Mairon dove into the giggling, gurgling stream. The water heated to his touch where he treaded and he watched the filth of his imprisonment wash away as he sank under the surface. The affectionate pressure of oxygen loss was welcome against his healthily beating heart. Mairon smiled.

Melkor had hated water, but all of Ulmo’s holy mutterings, carried upstream by his existence alone, could do nothing to dampen Mairon’s spirits. He had been reborn, he would prevail. Now more than ever.

When Mairon deemed himself sufficiently clean, pristine for the first time since the morning of a battle that had long gone blurry in his memory, he climbed back ashore. He stretched, fresh joints popping, when something nudged his shoulder. Mairon turned with a frown to find the little black flame bobbing up and down by his side. 

“You.” Mairon narrowed his eyes. Where before he had been tucked snugly into his new skin, he now felt exposed, vulnerable. His fingers tingled with energy and he wove a quick magic. The pearls of water on his skin sizzled away and soft cotton wove over it, around him, a simple robe of black with red ribbon lacing it shut at his sides. His hair rustled, braided itself down his neck and over his shoulder, tied with the same string. Now, he could treat. 

“What do you want of me?”

The flame stilled and Mairon, curiosity awoken in his chest, reached out. When his index finger plunged into the vapor it was not heat that engulfed him, but glacial shards that shot up his arm and paralyzed it. The pain was complex, wavering, but Mairon was too distracted by the scenes that rushed at him, memories pulled violently from the depths of his own mind.

The void, endless and empty safe for the dismissive wannabe-father that bore down on him. A hand that reached out and pulled him to shelter, humming sweet lullabies. 

A far-stretching plane, nothing but wastelands of flowers whose thick sweetness had Mairon sneeze until his nose was bloody and then a sword grazing his collarbone to free him. 

Melkor’s proud smile as he presented Gothmog to his court, the first Balrog, the brother Mairon had secretly yearned for. Theirs was the flame and the darkness.

A harsh whip that cracked through the air, then across his back.

Loud, booming laughter as Mairon presented Grond to his master, a weapon that would never be matched in its grandeur or the havoc it wreaked. 

Blood and silks stroking the insides of his thighs.

Melkor’s eyes as they parted the veil of darkness. 

It went on, every moment Mairon had experienced in Melkor’s presence replayed in a fraction of the time that had passed. Mairon recoiled and the stream of memories broke when their contact did. Mairon’s heart pounded frantically, reborn and overwhelmed already. His neck flushed. 

“What are you?” he asked. 

“You,” the flame hummed with a voice as smooth as velvet and an octave deeper than Mairon’s own. “Him.”

There was no guesswork involved in who ‘him’ was, not after those images. The last stronghold of ignorance yielded then, and Mairon understood the simple truth which made him question his own mental capacities as well as rekindled the grief he felt for his master by way of guilt-ridden fury. It was no virus. Not even a parasite. 

Melkor had planted a part of his Feä within Mairon’s where it had festered and nearly killed him. What hovered before him, less than an arm’s length away, was the result. A new spirit, equal parts Mairon and Melkor. 

“To what end?”

“Me,” the flame said. “Himmmmmmmm.” And it began to vibrate in a high frequency so that its wavering edges melted against the backdrop of the forest.

“He made you so I could rebuild him. Using you?”

“Him. Him. Himmmmmm.” 

Mairon pursed his lips. An idea struck him and it made him laugh out loud as the little flame zoomed around his head in frantic circles, repeating that word over and over. Mairon caught it between his palms, biting through the pain and pushing aside the assault of memories.

“I will do it,” he whispered through a crack between his thumbs. “I will raise you to the greatest throne there is. I will make you terrible and beautiful.” The flame wavered, scraped at Mairon’s palm. 

“Me?”

“Yes, you. And your name will be Bauglir.”

“Bauglir?” 

Mairon laughed again and opened his hands so that Bauglir could resume his whizzing, but he did not. He was perfectly still, expectant. A miracle that waited for Mairon to guide him, show him the next step. And Mairon knew exactly which one to take.


	6. A Matter of Patience

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Second half yaay. This is were all the Second Age stuff starts to unfold, definitely an exciting period in Middle-Earth history. I hope you enjoy :)
> 
> Probably violent themes, probably some gore. It's a Sauron-centered fanfic, I can't help it.

Mairon dimly remembered the first time he had crafted a body from thin air, back when the world had been overhung with dull ignorance of time and cycles of light. All had been an endless swamped then, topped by a dome that felt not new and brimming with a million possible futures, but gray. Weary with old age, a strange paradox as it had been newborn.

Under that firmament, Mairon had sung alongside his siblings to shape bones, sinew and muscle. Raise nervous systems from nothing and sculpt limbs, hands that would create and forge, burn and destroy. The process had come intuitively and little instruction from his former master, Aulë, had been necessary, but as Mairon had been in spirit form when he had made his first body, he had lacked the motor skills to mold the perfect indentations for joints to turn in or the soft sharpness of shoulder blades pushing against smooth skin. There had been the music, an instrument of magic in itself, yet barely useful to someone who had no understanding of harmony, no use for meter. Mairon had never been a musician and because of that, his first body had been littered with what he thought to be flaws.

To this day, he counted the long limbs that he had sported all over the Valar encampment, the freckles that had dusted his nose and cheeks, as some of his greatest shortcomings and he was about to make up for them. Now, he had hands and powers that were freer than those Aulë had granted him. Now, he would craft a body befit for a king.

“Bauglir.” An affirmative flicker. “Wait here,” Mairon said once an image had settled over his inner eye. He strutted in a wide circle around the spot over which Bauglir hovered and extended his spirit, let it seep into the ground. It created an invisible barrier so that any who came near it would be met with a wall of furious fire. They were far away from civilization and though strays would be rare - supposing Arda still worked according to Mairon’s understanding of it - it was better to be safe. Few of Eru’s Firstborn ventured here, not when the land of light was half a world away, but Men had spread to these parts, multiplying faster than rabbits. Superstitious menfolk stumbling in on them could be more fatal than wandering Elves. No need to become a vengeful god just yet. 

When he was done the protective wards, Mairon returned to the center of the circle and closed his eyes, humming under his breath. Indeed, music in itself was insufficient to his cause, but it helped to channel the initial burst of energy. Bauglir joined in the song, latched onto Mairon’s notes and pauses as though he had been bred for the purpose. A rush, his powers multiplied, scathing, surged through Mairon’s veins.

His fingers traced the image in his head, first pulling on hard bone made from floating molecules, then weaving layer upon layer of tissue until a heartbeat echoed through their clearing. A heartbeat that pumped hot, freshly synthesized blood through an otherwise lifeless shape. Mairon opened his eyes and his chest swelled. Pride tugged his face into small smile.

Bauglir’s body was the perfect facsimile of Mairon’s imagination, all lean muscle and fair skin, unblemished by his late creator’s gray taint. The pointy tips of his ears poked out between lavish waves of liquid void whose tips curled against the lowest set of ribs. Silver eyes hid coyly under long lashes that tickled high cheekbones and Mairon thought, as far as conventional beauty went, he had outdone himself. To an Elf, Bauglir would look like the pretty product of an interracial marriage. To Mairon, he looked like he would, with some roughening up, make a convincing emperor. A nice enough shell. 

Power would be the tipping factor between pretty and beautiful, dangerous and deadly. Now to hope that Bauglir had been blessed with the best of both his originators. 

Mairon stepped forward, fingers gliding down arms that hung lifelessly. They bulked up under his touch and then he kissed the cold cheeks, they flushed pale pink.

“For you,” Mairon murmured and inclined his head towards Bauglir’s Feä.

“Meeee.”

As Mairon himself had, Bauglir hesitated to claim the body. He zipped around it, humming more urgently now, nervous in the face of the unknown, until Mairon caught him once more and pushed the little spirit into the chest of the body.

Much unlike Mairon, Bauglir instantly struggled to control the vessel he had been given. He keeled over when the Feä had seeped into his skin, all the tranquility and equilibrium Mairon had so carefully planted disappeared. Bauglir lay face down in the grass, river-water beating his scowl, and let out a long, high-pitched whine.

“Stand up,” Mairon said. Visceral obedience made Bauglir go rigid and struggle to his feet. It lasted for all of two seconds before his knees gave in and Mairon patiently extended his hand to help him up. By the fifth time, a crackling bang crashed through the forest and Mairon only realized after the fact that Bauglir had blasted a hole through several trees as well as Mairon’s shoulder. 

“Ts,” he said and dusted off his robe, flesh and cloth spotless once more. “Try again.” 

“Am I deficient?” Bauglir’s eyes were blown into moon-like orbs, watery and searching for validation. Mairon’s stomach twinged and he reprimanded himself for it. Fatherly affection, if it could be called that, had no place in this scheme. 

“No, you are perfectly normal.” Which was easy to claim given that Bauglir represented his entire species. If he was anything like Melkor though, detrimental realism was not the way to approach a matter this delicate. Mairon’s options were to gloss it over or to instate the solution before the problem became apparent. 

“Then why can I not stand on my own to feet?” 

“Because,” Mairon said, keeping to a gentle tone as he took Bauglir’s hands in his and tugged at them so that Bauglir could lean against his chest for balance. “This world is not used to you yet.”

“Will it ever?” Bauglir sniffed. Once more, Mairon was reminded of himself in his early days. A lost spirit in a world to big for him. A follower whose sole desire was to please his superiors. Mairon cursed his own weak blood. Bauglir had to be stronger than that.

“Yes, dear. You are mighty and potent, able to bend gravity to your own will. Do you believe me or do you surrender?”

“No. Never.” 

“Then try again.” 

It took Bauglir the rest of day’s light and much of the moon’s company to learn to stand and stumble about. It took him another day to work his arms and weave magic and yet another to master intonation and the finely-tuned coordination of his fingers. 

They stayed in their artificial clearing by the river, sheltered by Yavanna and Ulmo without their knowledge. Mairon replenished the warding spells in a six-hour tact and prayed to no one in particular that the Valar would not cast their attention this far from their home soil. As they lingered, Mairon taught Bauglir the arts of guileful combat, of verbal deception. How to weave a glamour about himself and how to enter another’s mind with brute force. Bauglir was an eager student, hungry for more knowledge, control, power from the first day and soon he had mastered all that Mairon could teach him. 

Soon after, the fated day arrived on which they set out. To regain insight on the state of politics. To find a neat gap in civilization to slip into. To rebuild Melkor’s kingdom.

Spark by spark, Mairon deconstructed the barrier that shielded them from the outside world as much as held them in. He wove clothes for Bauglir and himself that befitted low-ranking Elvish nobility, gowns of shimmering silk and embroidered sleeves, sleek black boots of artificial leather. Then, Mairon transformed his own face lest he be recognized by some misfortune. A rounder chin, a sharper jawline, a widow’s peak. Light blond hair that hung straight down his back and the same set of quicksilver eyes he had given Bauglir to explain their entanglement. 

“One last thing,” Mairon said before Bauglir could comment on any of this. He muttered ancient and pure words, words he had not dared to think since the olden days of pointless servitude, and adorned them both with circlets of gleaming platinum and sapphire-set rings. Mairon consulted his reflection on the river surface and was met with approval. 

“Ready when you are,” Bauglir said, grinning. 

“Oh, I am ready,” Mairon crooned and straightened. “Come now, by my side.” 

So their long journey begun, in silent reverence of what was to come and with new identities to carve open the way. 

They wandered ever westward, from settlement to settlement. First to gather information about the happenings during the years Mairon had spent in isolation, then to sow darkness among Man and Dwarf alike. They circumnavigated the greater Elven realms for the time beings, though did not hesitate to seduce stray Elves to their cause whenever they happened upon them. With the help of Bauglir’s youthful imagination and Mairon’s hunch for opportunity, they made good headway, treading on a trail of anger and corruption, hate for the old. The beginning of a world that might just be open for something new. 

Many remembered the wars against Melkor, at least in folktale, and Mairon latched onto that, twisting the truth. The Elves and their cruel gods had initiated the feud. Theirs were the deaths of legions and the sundering of the world which had drowned all Beleriand. 

And in between these micro-seductions, Mairon told Bauglir of their glorious past and of Melkor who had shaped it and whose vision lived on in both of them. Bauglir listened, comprehended and carried out what Mairon demanded of him. 

When at last they came to the South, they beheld a great range of mountains that had sprouted in a sharp curve and separated many leagues of country from the Western kingdoms of Elves and Men. A lava-drooling mountain resided over leagues of wasteland and the skies were overhung with sooty clouds. Thunder shook the ground in rolling bursts and Mairon recognized the plains at once as a mirror image of what he had born inside of him. Melkor’s vision, ripe, ready to be plucked. 

The volcano was known among the Children under the simple name of Mount Doom and Mairon would make sure that would be its fate. This land of shadows and decay, this black land was more than ideal. It had been made for them.

“Bauglir,” he said one morning as they walked among trees that had adapted to the noxious, dust-laden atmosphere. Their trunks were shot through with veins of black, their lives disintegrated as fall wrapped its spindly arms around the world. “This is where it will start.”

“Yes, Ada,” Bauglir replied in a nasty habit he had picked up from the Elves they had met on their travels. Mairon cringed inwardly at the affection, a reminder of the pain he had suffered at the hands of this creature, but Bauglir was persistent. No amount of yelling and burning punishment from Mairon broke through. Bauglir was strangely resistant to Mairon’s wrath. He let it slip this time, and they headed towards Mount Doom which would welcome them with its gurgling, fire-spitting song. Towards a future that was written in pain. 

But not ours, Mairon thought, heart fluttering as he crouched on the lip of the stone and sank his hand into liquid fire. Not ours. 

In the years of their journeys among the people of Middle-Earth, Mairon and Bauglir had gathered to them a significant following. Feeble men, and outcasts of Elves, and beasts with sharp teeth and wild hears. Dwarfs there were also, though few for they dared not venture out of their caves for the most part and after several lengthy conversations, Mairon had no desire left to live amongst the Children of Aulë whom they so readily worshiped. Lesser spirits, rare these days what with the dominion of Men a prospect ever more present, were easily swayed to agree with Mairon’s and Bauglir’s schemes. Willingly or not. 

Their methods had been simple, but effective too. Mairon sweet-talked these weak souls, befriended them with promises and disguised warnings and against all his instincts and prejudices. Once they were open to it, Bauglir applied Mairon’s teachings to invade their minds and tether them to his own. 

When they did decide to settle at the base of Mount Doom, Bauglir invoked those slithers of bonds, and they came. Willingly or not. 

“I have built an army from scratch before,” Mairon said as they raised a palace from the ground, all jutting spikes and symmetric architecture, hand in hand, to call their own. “I can do so again. These souls will be the foundation of the greatest force Middle-Earth has seen since the War of Wrath and this time there will be no holy host to oppose us. The Valar have all but forgotten Middle-Earth. Give them a few more centuries and they will have forgotten us, too.” They released each other and stepped into their new home. Not a fortress yet, nor a residence for the King of All, but enough to walk the tightrope of exuding authority while crouching under the radar of those outside their lands. The first Elf stumbled into the courtyard of their new home hours later. 

Then, as if a lock had been popped open, Bauglir’s subjects arrived by the hundreds. The built settlements with their raw hands, nurturing the barren soil with their blood, sweat and tears. Some mimed changing their minds, but their fate was too closely tied to Bauglir’s. Turning back meant more fuel for the forges, or meat for the beasts to feast on. So, Mordor was born, named the land of shadow in honor of an omnipotent deity who, though exiled, would shape the country’s fortunes for years to come. 

Their plans, bred by hatred and conceived in shadow, unfolded, self-perpetuating, but as Mairon had news from the East by way of crow, he developed a notion of a new crossing of paths. One that would smooth the rough edges of his strategy, that would pave the path to leadership with adorned stone. Their randomly assembled force of lost souls was a baseline at best and there were methods of growth that required more subtle opportunities. One of which presented itself to him in that very message.

“Ada,” Bauglir said, urgency coloring his tone, and stepped onto the balcony of their makeshift palace where Mairon observed the day’s labors, mulling his idea over in his head. Infrastructure was a shy flower, slow to bloom even with Mairon’s mind at the planning board, but whips and chains proved effective nurture. In the last week alone, they had dug out a dozen wells, had erected barracks and training facilities and smithies that - though they were laughable next to Mairon’s mighty forges at Angband - provided sufficient weaponry. Mordor would grow with its leader, no doubt about it, and yet, the bitter taste of loss clung to Mairon’s tongue. It was all he could do to swallow around it and keep going. 

“Yes, dear,” Mairon replied, eyes fixated on two bulky Men whose skin was drenched in ink. They hauled a lithe Elf across the yard, towards the entrance of the dungeons. Soon, the first of a new generation of Orc would be born.

“You called for me?” Bauglir asked, and halted by Mairon’s side, looming a full head over him. His hair, to his hips now, streamed in loose braids down his front. Bauglir bore no crown upon his brow yet, something Mairon intended to rectify soon. 

“I did. Our spies have been industrious and brought it to my notice that Elves have settled in the shadow of the Misty Mountains. There is talk of a new realm by the name of Eregion. They say it was founded by Galadriel, niece of Feänor and Fingolfin.” Mairon paused to let the words sink in and waited for a reaction. On some days, they were sluggish given that Bauglir’s days had been short and the flood of information he had to comprehend never-ending. This time though, his reaction was instant: his neck flushed scarlet and a dangerous gleam brightened his silver eyes. The air about him wavered, the poisonous fumes thickening. 

“They who have waged for on us. They who have defiled my king and creator.” Mairon nodded solemnly though he could not help the swell of pride he felt at the gravity of Bauglir’s tone. “We will finally have our revenge.”

“Yes, we will.” 

“Let us hasten then. Strengthen our armies, march over the mountains and stomp their filthy realm into the ground ere it can rise,” Bauglir growled and when Mairon curled his fingers around the stone railing, he felt it vibrate under his fingers. Such potency, so much taming still to be done, he thought and sucked up the excess energy. His Feä flared up. 

  
“You are being overeager, love,” Mairon said. The nicknames had felt foreign on his lips at first, misplaced and misshapen, but they did wonders for Bauglir’s attentiveness. He was lost still, brokenhearted, and Mairon would play the doting father for as long as necessary. A part of him glowed at the concept. Alas, it could not last. “I have other plans.”

“What plans?”

“I mean to take them from the inside. Pose as one of their own and gain their trust. Then we will strike at their heart and they will be yours to command.”

“How? How could your worm your way into Galadriel’s heart? You told me there was no way to gain it.”

“Oh, it is not Galadriel I have in mind. She can choke on her pride for all I care. No. Word is that Celebrimbor, son of Curufin, is among those settled there. He and his people are smiths, a trade that happens to be my specialty.”

“You mean to gain their trust by teaching them? Have them work for you without their knowledge?”

“Indeed,” Mairon said with curled lips and touched his fingers to Bauglir’s knuckles. Warmth flowed between them, but Bauglir’s scowl persisted. 

“No,” he said, and a muscle in his jaw twitched.

“I am sorry?”

“No, I will not allow it. It would take too long.”

Mairon allowed himself a long exhale before he replied. “Time is the only investment we will have to make, the only resource we have plenty of. Look at this weak crowd.” He gestured at the few haggard faces that hurried to and fro, their ragged clothes. Noon meant efficiency squandered as the heat of the sun and the heat of the mountain sweltered in a dance mortals could not bear. Noon meant exposure of the real state of things. “It will take longer to make a potent army from this than to make you lord of an already existing force. Elves are naive, even in numbers, and I would see you ascend the throne ere the next age of our world is declared.” The ground vibrated in tandem with the stone walls and Mairon sighed once more, tightening his grip on Bauglir’s hand. He could resort to a proper scolding, but that had proved ineffective before. The only certain way to convince Bauglir of something was with rock-solid arguments, simple enough to penetrate his logic of blood and brutality. 

“I will not allow you to leave my side.”

“What have I told you?”

“To kill the unfaithful is the least they deserve.”

“In due time, yes,” Mairon conceded, biting at the inside of his cheeks. “But that is not what I meant.” 

“Never trust that which is naturally beautiful?”

“Apply my teachings to the situation, dear,” Mairon said through gritted teeth. He had discovered traces of himself in Bauglir, a definite affinity for fire, an ability to craft undetectable lies should the situation so demand, but more and more Melkor peeked through. Mairon would rejoice in that, if it did not test him this fervently at so many crossroads. “So?” 

Bauglir fixed his penetrating stare on Mairon, a cemented expression on his features. His knuckles whitened where his hands clamped over the handle of the sword Mairon had forged for him. 

“I am not dependent on anyone,” Bauglir said. “I am the future of this world.” 

“That you are. So you see, I cannot always dig the trench you pass through.”

“You leave me, then,” Bauglir said and his hand moved, lightning-fast, to clamp around Mairon’s forearm, his Feä thrashing against the barrier of skin. Mairon’s arm froze, skin turning necrotic where Bauglir touched it, even through his robes. His fingers tingled, numb, then blue and stiff. Even as his shoulder cracked in protest, Mairon did not pull away. He bore the punishment with a satisfied smile. This was the sort of behavior he wanted to encourage. If Bauglir was willing to harm his would-be father, he was ready to harm anyone. 

“Not yet and not forever.” 

Bauglir muttered, a dark curse under his breath which turned foul, as though he had wolfed down decayed troll, and below them a scream echoed. A young Elf of Silvan descent was propped up against the wall of a shack, hands clutched over her ears which bled profusely.

“Now now,” Mairon said, and released her by pulling Bauglir into an embrace. “If we are parted for a time, it is only for your benefit.”

“But Ada, what am I to do?”

“What you were born to. Rule these people. Make yourself inevitable.” For all his height and smooth angles, Bauglir folded neatly into Mairon’s arms. The anger seeped out of his limbs and into the atmosphere around them, replaced by diamond determination. 

“I am strong,” Bauglir said into the crook of Mairon’s neck. “I am king.” 

And so, they labored on until the day was upon them when Mairon judged Bauglir mature enough to be left alone. When he learned that Eregion was at its most vulnerable. He left not under outbursts of anger, but under proclamations of confidence and he kissed Bauglir on each cheek as they parted. It would be the last time Mairon saw this creature, this impossible creation of Melkor’s, display a genuine smile though that was not for him to find out for another six hundred years. 


	7. A Smith of Affection

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter... phew. I wrote about four to five different versions of it and in every single one of them Celebrimbor asserted himself as something I didn't want him to be, but in the end I had to comply. It's the longest, and ironically, one of my most favorite, and a bit of a mess. This happens sometimes and if you're a writer, you probably know what I mean :D
> 
> For all of you silvergifting-haters out there: be warned, there will be a few instances in this chapter.

The guise of Annatar never quite fit Mairon, now matter how much he tried to ease into it. 

It was tight around the chest, like an ill-fitting plate of armor. Annatar’s heart beat fast, arrhythmical, much more excitable than Mairon’s was. His skin was taut, dry for all its secret love affairs with Anar and had to be maintained constantly with oils and magic. His raiments hugged limbs, exaggerated muscle and revealed hints of the body underneath where before Mairon had preferred the airy and comfortable. On good days, Mairon managed not to squirm through the constant self-reminders. Uphold the facade. Smile. Play nice.

Contrary to that, Annatar was but a phantom to Mairon’s hands. They welcomed the tongs like a long lost limb, created of their own accord, spared no second thought to burn marks and cuts as they caressed ore and anvil. That was all Mairon and potentially fatal. He could not afford to forget the version of himself he had created. Could not be ignorant of those who had cursed him in the past, had broken into his home and wrecked his life’s work, who would have him burning at the stake if they but knew his true name. No, he had to help them. 

There were those who noticed the ill-suited outer layer, not for what it was, but for a thing to be mistrusted at least. Elrond was one of them, another accursed descendant of Luthien’s, and Gil-Galad, now High-King. Unfortunately, this suspicion closed Eriador’s gates to Mairon, but it mattered not. Galadriel welcomed him even though she harbored her apprehensions and Celebrimbor and his Gwaith-i-Mírdain were quick to worship him. Which meant, in spite of his and Annatar’s differences, Eregion would be theirs ere the millennium drew its last breath. 

The only part of Mairon that worked seamlessly with Annatar was his intellect and creativity. It pained him to admit it, but he did some of his most refined work among the Elves. Swords with arm-guards that depicted the creation of Arda in intricate weavings of gold and silver, Eru’s song forming the blade in curving iron. Jewels that glowed like dragon fire and crowns befitting the Elven Kings of old. Always, someone hovered by his elbow, eager to study and be guided. 

He spent most of his days as such, buried in creation, shunning daylight by way of never laying eyes upon it. He needed only fire to see by and soon his students did too. Much like Bauglir had infected Mairon prior to his birth, Mairon sweet-talked his way into the smiths’ ranks, into their hearts.

By nightfall, revels sprouted from the ground. Grand feasts where the wine flowed like the river Anduin, steadfast and voluptuous, and the Elves danced excessively under the intoxicating sway of the Music of the Elves, so unlike the music Mairon had been born to, danced until mortal Men would have their feet worn away. Before Bauglir, Mairon had not favored food, but now he enjoyed the sweet and savory symphony of honey-coated goat cheese, the acidic sting of vegetables drenched in vinegar, the salt that crusted his lips after devouring plate after plate of roasted potato. The buttery petals that curled against his tongue as he washed it all down with flower-scented tea. 

He even condescended to a dance or two when asked by a blushing Elf, be they male or female. It was a necessary panel in the stained glass reputation he build for Annatar. As were the arms full of fine jewelry and pretty weapons he brought to the revels, as cutting-edge as they were decorative. As was the way he left the dances, with a blush high in his cheeks and blossoms woven through his hair. So high-spirited that it was easy to forget he did not actually enjoy himself. 

All this laughter and gaiety was barely tolerable for a mind so keen on destruction and his itch for it grew more urgent by the day. But the wine helped and Annatar’s lithe body was made for twisting around other bodies, ecstatic and elegant, and so Mairon attended and gifted and drank and danced his way to the love of those that were not, by default or job description, close to him. 

There were other nights too, when the revels seemed to take place on a different plane of existence because Mairon had other business to attend to. Much more critical and, dare he think, fun. That business involved the heir of one that had driven Melkor into madness, the newly named lord of Eregion, the most skilled smith Mairon had met in his lifetime. An uncut diamond, ready to best even his grandfather.

Not merry at heart, nor caring for things other than the clanging chimes of metalwork and the wavering heat of burning coals, Celebrimbor stayed away from the festivities. This circumstance offered ample opportunity for Mairon to be alone with him and work his silver tongue. He had several ideas of what Celebrimbor needed to hear and a plan of what to do once he was ensnared. It was all on the execution. 

“Do you not get lonely,” Mairon asked on one such occasion. The music had faded and Ost-in-Edhil was settling into an incense heavy slumber. Celebrimbor was bent over a piece of jewelry, a ring of twisting titanium ropes, a sunrise-colored miniature of Laurelin perched where they coiled together. His shoulders rode up to his ears and sweat beaded on his temples. He did not look up when Mairon settled on the workbench opposite his table, clad in satin robes of jade. A gift from an admirer.

“This work is all the company I desire presently, mylord, and I would ask you to respect that,” Celebrimbor muttered, and his fingers were perfectly steady as he set another piece of the trunk. Mairon’s stomach dropped at these words, a bout of homesickness to lap at the careful expression of amused nonchalance he put on whenever around the Feänorian prince. This could have been a scene pulled right out of his own memories, roles reversed. Celebrimbor the oblivious one, Mairon beckoning with seductive promises. 

“Am I not your teacher?” Mairon’s lips peeled back in pleasure when Celebrimbor’s eyes darted over to him and he laid down his tools. “And did you not welcome my presence the night before last?” 

“I require no guidance in this endeavor, nor your conversation.” 

“And what about my praise?” Mairon purred and rose. A color clung to the Elf’s cheek, scarlet and orange, writhing in the firelight like the core of Mount Doom. Not nearly as clamorous though. “Well?”

“It was to be a gift to you.” 

Mairon’s smile strained against how his insides wilted, how he recoiled at the thought of bearing the image of the Valar’s cursed creation on his hand. Oh, but little Celebrimbor was biting his lip, blushing so prettily. Mairon’s fingers twitched with the desire to use the anvil between them to smash the Elf’s face in.

“Explain.”

“I know how it feels to be parted from the Blessed Realm, to live every day in shadow, no matter how bright the light of day might be. And even though you are free to return at any time, I gather your work here is far from finished. This ring was to be a token to remember home by.” 

I will burn your cursed home to the ground, Mairon thought bitterly, but he willed his skin to soften and brushed his fingertips along Celebrimbor’s jawline. His skin was warm with blood and firelight. His breath hitched when Mairon leaned forward, their noses almost touching. A dangerous prospect, dangerously useful. But Mairon would not close the distance, would not yet give Celebrimbor what he yearned for. Better to have him crawling at his feet, thirsty for what could never be.

Mairon’s gaze flitted towards the ring which mocked him in its glittering beauty. He could not wear it, but it send the cogs in his head spinning. An idea emerged. Rings, more than any other piece of jewelry on this continent, were worn and exchanged as tokens of love, friendship, and power. Gone was the age of elaborate diadems and Gondolin swords, gone the Silmarils and all the jewels that had paled in their feeble attempts to imitate them. A useful cultural development. 

“Do you find it inappropriate?” Celebrimbor asked, halting Mairon’s train of thought. Mairon carefully arranged his features into a grimace of pain, used his contempt to let slip tears that splashed against the anvil. “Mylord?”

“I thank you for your thought and labor,” he said. “But to be reminded of the beauty of Laurelin every day when I can never look upon her true form again is too agonizing. Forgive me, my friend, but I cannot accept this gift.” And Mairon tore away from Celebrimbor with a raw sob that was all Annatar’s flair for the dramatic, and fled the room. He would let Celebrimbor’s feelings simmer for now. 

Mairon spent the nights under thin cotton sheets, feigning sleep should the neighbors happen to glance at his humble lodging. He used that time to communicate with Bauglir over a mental link they had established prior to his departure, exchanging statistics, advancement, sentiment even. Bauglir’s army progressed and grew, though the head count had risen drastically since Mairon’s departure. Alas, Mairon could do no more than offer words of caution and advice and reassure that his return was not far off.

_I would not be where I am without you_ , Bauglir said by way of expressing his dissatisfaction with the circumstances. _And I do not wish for this sentiment to ring differently once I am Lord of the Continent._

_Patience, dear._ Patience for both of them.

Mairon arose with the sun to find a letter on his doorstep. This was by no means unusual as many of the Elves were open with their affections toward one who claimed to be a messenger of their Gods and left him notes, poems, fragments of song. He did not roll his eyes as he picked it up solely because there might be curious eyes around, loitering in the shadows to watch his reaction. There was no seal on it, just a plain dribble of wax that Mairon pried open, schooling his reaction into curiosity. 

_Meet me at the Eastern gate at noon._

Mairon raised his eyebrows at the clear, mechanical strokes, precise even in writing. He had known Celebrimbor to be brazen at times, but never commanding, not towards Annatar. It was obvious now why it was neither sealed nor signed properly as many would have reacted with scorn at their lord’s claim to the time of everyone’s favorite Maia. Mairon smiled and the paper blackened and curled in his palm, sizzling away as he retreated to dress himself. This was bound to get interesting.

Celebrimbor waited for him outside the city bounds, wearing not his usual workman’s tunic, but an elaborate robe of midnight blue and silver. A cloak lay draped over his shoulders that reflected the sunlight and made his eyes appear in a stark, light blue. His dark hair was unbound for once.

“So,” Mairon said, and accepted a one-armed hug, an established ritual among the smiths which he had only recently been allowed to partake in. “You have succeeded in luring me here, master smith, what now?” 

Celebrimbor smiled wryly, and gestured for Mairon to follow him, away from the square buildings of Ost-in-Edhil.

“The Dwarf Narvi and I have collaborated on a magical passageway, privy to those who are friends of Durin and his folk,” Celebrimbor explained as they set off side by side into the shadow of the Misty Mountains. Mairon was aware of the great friendship Celebrimbor had established between Eregion and the Dwarfen realm deep within the mountains, the sheer amount of Mithril the Elf imported evidence enough, but he meant to stay away from those bridges. Feared they would crumple under his weight. If Celebrimbor was the one to lead him over though, well. Mairon ought to comply and Annatar felt a spike of arousal at the thought of more souls to lure into his schemes, more false friends to make. “I thought you might advise us on how to improve it.” No mention of last night’s incident, so unlike his perished kin who had held their grudges with deadly efficiency and had worked to ruin even the relationships they entertained amongst each other. This was Celebrimbor apologizing, this was Celebrimbor being a genuine surprise.

“I’d be honored to,” Mairon replied with a curt nod. Unaware of the consequences, Celebrimbor was about to hand him one of the greatest gifts imaginable. The way into Khazad-dûm.

A Dwarf, stout as a tree stump, waited for them by a puddle of a lake, in the shadow of blank stone. His long plum-colored hair and matching beard were braided and woven through with beads of ruby and his bare arms littered with burn marks and scars. A self-satisfied gleam in his eyes that tracked their every step. As they arrived, he drew Celebrimbor into a short hug as though he did not tower over him, twice the Dwarf’s size. 

“My friend,” Narvi drawled. Before he let go of Celebrimbor, he clanked their foreheads together, drawing a barely noticeable flinch from the Elf. Mairon made retching noises in his mind, loud enough that it drew a questioning impulse from Bauglir’s side. He ignored it. 

“Narvi,” Celebrimbor replied, and rubbed the reddened skin where their heads had collided, straightening up. “This is Lord Annatar of whom I have spoken.”

“Pleased to meet you,” Mairon said with a small bow. Annatar dissected the dwarf’s expression. Sharp gaze, glowing cheeks, micro-twitches of his ear, a self-assured smile. Not enough information to plot the best path into that dull little mind. Not yet. 

“Aye, pleasure indeed. To meet an associate of our Great Maker is an honor beyond measure, mylord. I hope you find joy in our craft. Have you brought the rock?” Narvi addressed Celebrimbor with a raised chin. Celebrimbor nodded and produced a package from somewhere inside his robes, a lump wrapped in cloth.

“Where is this infamous doorway then?” Mairon asked.

“Right ‘ere,” Narvi said, and tapped the solid rock behind him. 

“The door is inlaid with Ithildin,” Celebrimbor explained, unwrapping the package.

“And how do you plan to conjure starlight under a midday-sun?”

“A gift from the Lady of Light herself.” The cloth fell away to reveal a fist-sized gemstone that shone in a brilliant white light, brighter than the sun. “Passed down from my grandfather.”

Annatar’s heart leaped as he marveled at the jewel’s beauty. Mairon resisted the urge to shield his eyes or, worse, grab the infernal rock and smash it against the mountainside. All magic of Varda’s was painful, demanding, and where Melkor used to reign, her light had never penetrated. To see it carried around so carelessly was more than an insult to his presence. Not that Celebrimbor was aware, of course.

“I see.”

Celebrimbor held the gem high, angling it at the stone wall and where its rays hit, an outline took shape, a glowing door framing two trees and a crown. Yet another reference to Mairon’s favorite pieces of perished flora. An inscription ran along the top of the door, a laughable riddle, that had Annatar rejoice. The way into the hearts of these creatures was illuminated brightly.

The Doors of Durin, Lord of Moria. Speak, friend, and enter. I, Narvi, made them. Celebrimbor of Hollin drew these signs. 

“Mellon,” Mairon murmured and with a heaving groan, the doors swung open. Narvi burst into bellowing laughter, a fist on his chest. 

“And you,” he gasped between waves, pointing at Celebrimbor. “You were so proud.” 

“Well, I should have anticipated this,” Celebrimbor replied curtly and returned the gemstone to its hidden compartment. The naivety of these creatures - not affection for them - had Mairon smile as he stepped up to the door and traced its smooth curves, the inscriptions which tingled and scratched at his skin. Interesting. 

“It is well-made,” he said once Narvi’s bellows had trickled to giggles and Celebrimbor’s silence threatened to turn sour. They both beamed at him, and clapped each other on the back. 

“With that over with with, may I invite mylords to food and drink? We have numerous feasts going at all times and our King is gracious and kind. He will receive you gladly, Celebrimbor as our friend and you, Lord Annatar, as an envoy of our beloved Maker,” Narvi said. His voice had morphed into a friendly growl and he bowed. 

“Your hospitality is gracefully noted,” Mairon said, and offered the Dwarf his hand, wishing he could burn, break, tear as he shook it. Annatar scowled at his next words. “Another time, perhaps.”

“Mylord? Are you not eager to meet the Children of your master?”

“I am and I will. But I should like to reward them with the same generosity with which they would receive me and ask humbly to delay our meeting until such an occasion presents itself.”

“You are most kind, Lord Annatar,” Narvi grunted. “But there is no need for any gift other than your presence and, perhaps, a word from the great Mahal.” Mairon pretended to contemplate this. It had been thousands of years since last he had seen Aulë, even longer since he had listened to his booming voice, but he reckoned little had changed in the mind of the Great Smith. He would not have trouble thinking of a crafty lie or two to sell the Dwarfs. Make them think their maker still cared, and appease the part of himself that wanted to buy their approval with gifts. 

The Dwarfs would be powerful allies too, the problem was that Mairon wanted to vomit at the thought of occupying the same table as them, pretending to be merry and honored to be there. Melkor would have ripped his limbs out at the mere suggestion. Alas, desperate times, and so he nodded, gestured for Narvi to lead the way as he latched onto Celebrimbor’s arm. 

Perhaps what followed was, per Dwarfish standards, a splendid afternoon, a feast worthy of Mahal’s associate and their Noldo friend. Perhaps the standard did not so much matter as the level of intoxication. Perhaps this was a natural consequence of dwelling under a mountain, but Mairon had never attended a duller revel. 

The ale was stale, the food undercooked, the company beyond bland. There were those who worshiped him without condition or end in the nasty guise of pestering questions about Aulë and his great plans for Durin’s folk, the consistency of his beard and the shape of his hammer and the architecture of his forges. There were those who competed for a chance to present their self-roasted pig or hand-brewed mead, who put crude and tasteless jewelry on his fingers and around his wrists, all for a word of praise. The King attended, but he too busied himself with fantasies of a visit by Mahal. The musicians were studied, but their instruments out of tune, grating over Mairon’s eardrums.

If Mairon was bored, Annatar was out of his mind. He was used to lavish excesses, and curving bodies that gave off delicious heat, was used to slender fingers dragging through his hair or his own tanned ones adorning his friends with jewels. He was used to beardless smiles and sweet perfume.

Which was why the only saving grace turned out to be Celebrimbor. He remained glued to Mairon’s side, pliant after two mugs of ale, and eager to sate Mairon’s and Annatar’s needs. Always one hand on Mairon’s shoulder, back, thigh, arm, he supplied answers to the endless questions about Aulë, pointed out the thick veins of Mithril that ran through the inside of the mountain, refilled Mairon’s cup with the better selection of alcohols. Between courses, he showed Mairon to Narvi’s workshop, a welcome spot of respite. 

As the Elf pointed out tools and machinery, he leaned into Mairon’s side so that his smell drowned out the musk of the Dwarfs that lived here and Mairon could trick himself into thinking they were back in Ost-in-Edhil, back in their forge. Annatar drank it in, the leather and coal dust, the honey-sweetness that tended to cling to Elves. Neither of them listened to what Celebrimbor actually said, and Mairon watched himself reach out, horrified, but unable to stop, reach out to twirl a strand of silken hair between those of his fingers that were not blemished by the rings he had been gifted.

“All this Dwarfen handiwork is very fascinating and all,” he murmured and Celebrimbor stilled in his explanation of Narvi’s latest generation of battle axes. When he turned they were nearly chest to chest. “But to smiths of our caliber, this is child’s play.” 

“I do not claim to be your equal,” the Elf said, deferent now, but there was an anxiety in the thunder of his heartbeat. He wanted his walls to go back up, to return to a space where the next creation was the most prevalent thing on his mind. Mairon knew the feeling all too well, remembered it with exquisite, bittersweet melancholy. Too much of himself was written across Celebrimbor’s age-worn, naive features which was perhaps the reason he handed Annatar the reins. Annatar who drank Celebrimbor’s words up like rich wine, who struggled against the confines of his existence as a role. It was as alluring as it was perilous. It was a strategy to best take charge of what force Eregion could muster, nothing more. 

“It is the curse of the artist not to recognize his own skill,” Annatar said, hand still idly playing with Celebrimbor’s hair. This time he let their noses brush against each other. His lips twitched at Celebrimbor’s startled inhale. “So you simply have to believe me when I say that you are. My equal and more.” 

“Mylord, you cannot-”

“Hush, Celebrimbor. I think it is high time we drop the formalities,” he said, eyelids drooping as he tilted his head. The Elf’s breath tingled his face, so close now that he could make out the distinct shades of color in Celebrimbor’s eyes. Like the bluebells that hugged the city walls, like the sapphires he wore on his fingers, like the rain-pregnant clouds over the highest peaks when the stone-giants battled. Annatar counted the small flecks of gray in them, as though Celebrimbor’s eyes contained swirling ashes, not unlike those of Bauglir. Not unlike those of Melkor. 

It was that thought that had Mairon roar in horror. Celebrimbor was nothing like Melkor, he was a meager Elf, a sorry remnant of a wretched house. This was vile at best, a betrayal of his oaths at worst, he had to stop this. He was powerless to stop this. Annatar would not yield control over the vessel they shared, no matter how much Mairon struggled to expel him. He cursed Celebrimbor and his defective lineage, pictured how he would carve him open once this was done, imagined his screams even as Annatar closed the remaining gap and stole a lingering kiss off the Elf’s lips. They were plump and eager, as easy to mold as the metals whose names they uttered so reverently, and Annatar would have grabbed Celebrimbor by the neck, would have crossed a line Mairon had not even thought of since the Last Battle. 

For once, Mairon found himself grateful for the thunderous stampeding of Dwarfs, their inability to read social cues. When Narvi burst into the workshop, ale foam stark against his facial hair, Annatar and Celebrimbor broke apart, though the Elf remained close to his side. 

“Mylords, you would not want to miss my cousin’s minced meat pie, it is the best in our humble kingdom,” Narvi bellowed and dragged them off by the cuff of their robes. Annatar glowed, content for the moment, and Mairon was the one who returned to the dinner table, who made up stories about Aulë and his exploits, who made sure to sit opposite Celebrimbor rather than next to him. He could not let it happen again. 

He bode his time until his lips stung with the bitter taste of the ale and his stomach churned with half-raw chicken breast. It was all he could do not to let the whole mountain range crumple in on itself and bury the lot of them. It was then also that he deemed it polite to take leave. 

“Lord Annatar,” the Dwarf King boomed, sauce spilling from the corners of his mouth. It mingled with the beard, ale and crumbs that framed his face. “Will you not stay a while longer? The night is young and our barrels still full.” Mairon wanted to groan, but he inclined his head, caught Celebrimbor’s knee under the table and squeezed it lightly.

“Your company has been exquisite and your ale excellent,” Mairon said, and pasted on a sugary smile as he turned his gaze to his companion. “But duty calls, does it not, dear?” Celebrimbor blinked, nodded mutely. 

As a farewell, the dwarfs produced even more jewelry, golden chains they draped around his neck and colorful gems they braided into his hair. By the end of it, he felt like a storage unit more than a revered guest. If Melkor could have seen him, there would have been hell to pay, grand, painful and burning humiliation. Mairon swallowed around the bitterness and thanked his hosts for the honor. Narvi held them up with the promise of a new shipment of Mithril by the end of the week, a convenient circumstance for what was brewing in the back of Mairon’s mind. 

From the point that Mairon had decided to leave until they were done with the farewells an hour passed and then they were finally on their way, Mairon plowing I  
on ahead. Celebrimbor followed with a teetering gait, as if in a drunken stupor. Ever so often, he had to catch himself on statues of Durin’s line, on mine carts, on shoulders that barely reached his hips. 

But that was not delay enough. Once they were out of the mine, the Ithildin faded, a gentle gale to replace the stuffy air, Celebrimbor hovered by the water, looking forlorn. His mouth drooped, his eyes shimmered. The chaotic tangle of his emotions reflected within them, messy and palpable and bright, and though it was Mairon in control, he could not look away. Could this sorry little soul contain the same storm as Melkor once had after all? All rumbling thunder and uncontrollable flashes of emotion, of pain and fury and passion? 

No.

Of course not. 

It was an earthly trouble, caused by Mairon’s lapse of control, by Annatar’s confused actions, that painted Celebrimbor in more saturated colors. Infatuation strengthened by a kiss so the Elf might call it love. Neither him nor Annatar would ever know true love, not the way Mairon had.

“What is it?” he asked and stopped in his tracks. A sigh hovered dangerously close on the edge between his thoughts and his lips. When Celebrimbor spoke his voice was as sturdy as the Mithril he so admired and interlaced with the same sparkling softness.

“There is a great weight on my chest. It has troubled me for hundreds of years, ever since the rebellion of my people. I miss the company of my uncles, my cousins, I miss the whimsical magic of Lorien and the grave councils of the Valar. I miss the way music carried on the air and bird song was ever-present. I do not understand how the rest of my kin can thrive here, in this forsaken place, when it threatens to drown me in sorrow. No matter how diligently I work, how engaged I am, how desperately I try to recreate the beauty of the Blessed Realm, I always come up short. Nothing I do can give me that peace back. But you? You have returned it to me with a few simple lines of greeting. You… well. I do not know how to express it without sounding rash and foolish.” Celebrimbor’s gaze was fixed to the mirror-surface of the lake and Mairon cocked his head. He knew what Celebrimbor meant to express and despised himself for not taking better care to rein Annatar in. 

“Celebrimbor,” Mairon said, hating how apologetic he sounded. Celebrimbor deflated. 

“I had not meant to overstep my boundaries. But after Narvi’s workshop I thought… forgive me.” 

“You have not overstepped and I am not angry. I recognize the words you cannot speak aloud and do not judge you for them, but I cannot give you what you seek, no matter my own feelings on the matter. My duties forbid it and my master would not welcome it. Back in the mountain, I should not have kissed you. It was a moment of weakness if you will, and I am the one that has to ask your forgiveness.” 

“I understand,” Celebrimbor murmured. He looked defeated, shoulders hunched. Pity gripped Mairon’s heart, but he vanquished it quickly, recalled himself to reality. Celebrimbor too seemed to gather himself. When he tore himself away from the lake and met Mairon’s gaze, there was steel there. There was determination. That, Mairon could work with. 

“Come with me, son of Curufin,” he said, grinning wolfishly. “Let us return to the forges and create miracles. Let us cross the lines of the imaginable.” He offered Celebrimbor his arm and walked him back to the city, back to the one place in Ost-in-Edhil where Mairon felt truly at ease and Annatar took the backseat for good. 

They began their greatest labor yet that night, traded visions and ideas. At the tail end of this particular creation, Mairon would dominate much more than just Eregion. He only had to convince Celebrimbor it was for everyone’s benefit and then, Bauglir would emerge. 


	8. A Battle of Deceit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright, things are getting spicy hehe. This chapter spans so many years it's honestly kind of a highlight reel, but it isn't the first one in this fic to do that and it's kind of the style I resigned myself to with this ambitious of a project :D Thank you to everyone who's been kudo'ing and commenting, I hope you enjoy the chapter! 
> 
> (that being said, the next chapter is where it's really at, I'm so excited for you all to read the ending!)
> 
> Warnings: probably violence and gore

The Forging of the Rings, as it would later go down in the written chronicles, was one of the greatest labors of Celebrimbor’s life, one of the greatest tests of Mairon’s patience. Watching Ancalagon mature, creating the first Orcs, even tirelessly working against Angband’s decay after Melkor had seized the Silmarils, had all been child’s play. 

It did not, as historians liked to depict it later, happen in a matter of hours. Nor days, not even weeks. It was a long-winded process that consisted of many a trial and error, of discussions deep into the noon of the next day, indeed unlike anything Arda had ever witnessed. Celebrimbor and Mairon spent most of it hunched over sketches of designs, diagrams, crammed lines of writing, theories, whole dissertations on the properties of different gem stones to act as vessels of magic. And always, differing opinions hung over them like ripe clouds of a thunderstorm, threatening to burst any moment and wash away all they had achieved so far. As the years trickled by, this threat grew, sometimes filled the room so wholly that there was no space left for the two of them. 

It was then that Celebrimbor would retreat into his manor and wander its empty corridors, calling upon the spirits of his predecessors to guide him through this creation that seemed to him bigger than himself. At least that was what Mairon supposed he did, judging by the way his character hardened in these intervals, his determination diamond-solid. By the glimmer behind his eyes that was all Feänor’s spirit, too fast, too clever, too arrogant for everyone around him to keep up with. By the silver diadem that had gone dull with age, stars sprinkling its surface, an heirloom of Curufin Celebrimbor sported for a fortnight or so after these periods of radio silence. 

At the same time, Mairon would sit by his own fireplace, hands and feet engulfed in flame and hold lengthy councils with Bauglir who had morphed form a head-strong, heated child into a capable commander, though his narcissism tended to get the better of him. Their ranks festered in the dark, yet unnoticed by the world of Men, but Bauglir was eager to unleash them.

 _Let me lead raids. The Orcs are hungry for blood and we could use the resources_ , Bauglir would propose and when Mairon told him it was not yet time, he would rage and roar which had Mordor quake in fear.

 _Why is it taking you so long, can you not return_ , Bauglir would cry in frustration and Mairon’s guts would pull sharply, sometimes spilling their breakfast. It was the bond, it had gotten stronger and Bauglir’s moods crossed it as easily as a deer would prance over a stream. This was manageable when Mairon was by himself, but hindered his work flow when locked up with Celebrimbor in their shared study. 

_Because_ , Mairon would reply calmly, wiping the bile from his lips, _I am crafting a mighty weapon for you. Beyond what our enemies could conceive, beyond even what you might imagine._

That would silence Bauglir and he would return to the labor of breeding and forging like an obedient dog. Celebrimbor and Mairon would come together with refreshed vigor not long after in a repetition of a cycle that was soon well-established. 

Through argument, affection or aggression, Mairon always prevailed, but the process grated his nerves. Celebrimbor took his work seriously, so much so that Mairon felt inclined to keep him around after the fact (not that he would, too dangerous, unthinkable). Celebrimbor was bestowed with more intellect than he let on outside of his work. Many of Eregion’s Elves, though full of admiration for his skills, smiled down upon him. The obsessed little lord, one of the last relics of the Great Houses and instead of acting the part, he holed himself up in his forges. Perhaps, they mused, he had gotten whacked over the head in one battle or another, perhaps he had been born that way. Perhaps it was a curse by the Valar that opened the vaults of intelligence for him at the dire cost of his heart.

Mairon, though it pained him to admit it, could once more relate to the Elf. When first Arda had been made and all the Valar and Maiar had labored together to create the landscapes, see to it that the world was habitable, he had been akin to Celebrimbor. Always working, rarely looking over his shoulder. That did not mean, however, that arguing with him was any easier. Especially because the extensive labor in the smithies meant that Annatar had all but faded to a small voice in the back of his mind. Diminished, but yet a useful tool.

“And what specific powers would the rings give the bearer?” Celebrimbor asked, and Mairon smiled, sickly-saccharine and explained what he had in mind.

“And how would that benefit Men?” Celebrimbor went on and Mairon took a long exhale, laid out endless scenarios of political intrigue, intricate strategies of fabricated wars against nonexistent kingdoms, all fantasy, all nonsensical. It mattered not what he said, only that he insisted thoroughly enough, that he tilted himself closer to Celebrimbor as he said it. Voice pivoting into a gentle murmur until the Elven Prince’s patience and common sense were worn threadbare and he agreed with a fluttering heartbeat. 

“And what about the Dwarfs?” Celebrimbor asked and Mairon bridged the oxygen-deprived, ink-stained space between them and kissed his cheek. 

“Let me worry about the Dwarfs.”

So they went, in an endless cycle. A clever Elf who questioned anything and everything his teacher brought to the table. A half-burning Maia who felt cloven in two, more so as the days went by. Mairon tired of these discussions, tired of the separation from Melkor and with each year that passed, sentimentality frayed his edges. To be young again, to have Melkor by his side, a strong, unblemished hand on his shoulder, a rare kiss. But at the same time his hunger for power was insatiable. Melkor was lost, but Bauglir was ready, potent, eager to crush those who had taken everything from Mairon. It was but a matter of time, Mairon told himself when bitter frustration clogged up his airways and he had to turn his back on Celebrimbor with tears stinging in his eyes. 

So they went, so they forged. 

Seven Rings for the Lords of the Dwarfs who cowered in their caves of stone. 

Nine Rings for Mortals who were doomed to a short life, but would be enhanced by this gift.

And all along, Mairon had in mind another ring. One that was bound to change the fate of the world forever.

When their work was wrapped up, the last argument fought out, the ovens cold and the hammers hung back on their pegs, Celebrimbor and Annatar parted, each to their own path in life. Having been glued to each other’s sides for almost a century, the separation was a natural progression. Like the changing of the seasons, Celebrimbor was whisked away by his own inhibitions as he understood that their time together was over. Annatar had to return home, had to adhere to his master. Mairon intended to do just that and if, by circumstance or fate, home lay on the other side of the compass, Celebrimbor would not be any the wiser for it.

The love the Elf carried in this heart had died to simmering coals and had, by the end, surfaced only in heated moments at the top of their lungs when Mairon had raged through their study, wanting with every fiber of his being to finish these forsaken rings. Celebrimbor had borne it, had rebounded insults and accusations from a corner of the room, all muscles in his body taut as if ready to prance and claw Mairon apart, though whether in passion or murder, had been unclear. Mairon had not let himself be spoiled by Noldor filth and not even the remnants of Annatar had been able to sway him. He had glowered and then, as was Celebrimbor’s way, they had gone back to work as though nothing had transpired. 

“I trust you to distribute the rings among the nobility of the other races,” Mairon had said when the last gem had been set, and Annatar had smiled at Celebrimbor’s solemn nod. Everything considered, he had done well.

  
The parting feast was the most lavish yet. Wine like a monsoon speckled lips and table cloth alike, and ballads filled the air with tales of Annatar the Great Smith, Annatar the Lord of Gifts, Annatar who would pave the path back to Valinor for all those who were denied passage still. They danced until sunrise, everyone in Ost-in-Edhil except for Celebrimbor who, his mind moved on to the next project, had holed himself up in his workshop once more. Mairon found him there, pouring over sketches. Black ink on his cheeks like freckles and he chewed on the end of a quill. He had braided his dark hear tightly around his head and wore a leather apron that was as creased as his forehead. Mairon smirked. So serious, so wrapped up. Soon, he would be bathing in the blood of his kin. 

“Annatar,” Celebrimbor said without looking up as Mairon leaned against the heat-warped frame of the door, wrapped in long silks of scarlet. A half-filled goblet dangled from his hand. “Is it time?” 

“It is.”

Celebrimbor straightened, brow furrowed.

“We will meet again,” he said.

“I should think so,” Mairon replied and hid his smile in a long gulp of wine. It invigorated him, sent his blood thrashing. In this at least, he had gotten a taste for Elven culture, their alcohol was exquisite. 

“When?” 

“Soon, and under much different circumstances.”

“Do you mean to say that I will be able to return?” Celebrimbor asked, brightening. He would, of course, never lay eyes on the Blessed Realm again, not in this life. 

“Who knows exactly what the future holds,” Mairon said and bowed deeply. “Keep watch for me, Son of Curufin. When I return, all will be clear. Farewell.” He did not wait for the reply. Better to have the last word in this, too. 

Alas, the completion of the sixteen Rings of Power for the mortal races was not the dusk of Mairon’s smithing efforts nor even the most costly. As he had told Bauglir, time was a resource they had aplenty, and so the mental strain of softening Celebrimbor was the only true sacrifice he had had to make. But the Rings and their magic would be useless to Mairon until he completed the next stage of his plan. 

To achieve this, he crossed the Misty Mountains, snow melting with hisses under his light steps. Homebound, destiny-bound, future-bound. Mairon had many a grand word in mind for the age to come and all of them amounted to the same idea: Bauglir and him would shape it according to Melkor’s legacy, to Melkor’s vision. And it would be majestic beyond compare.

 _My darling son_ , he thought, heart spilling over and into the link, so joyous was he to be rid of the Elves’ reeking, squeaky-clean inhabitation. Bauglir perked up at once.

_Ada?_

_Rejoice for I return to your side._

_Do you bring the force I was promised?_

_What I will offer to you is greater than any army the Elves could have conjured. Not long now, love._

The gloom that had gathered over Mordor was visible from afar, and Mairon beheld its sooty, orange-flickering dome when he had leagues to walk yet. How the surrounding settlements had not raised suspicion to the greater kingdoms was beyond him, but he attributed it to the steady trickle of followers that still appeared in the mountain passes, there to join the cause of this rumored new lord who had ascended to free the world of the cruelty of the Gods. The Gods whose fault it had been that the world was sundered and its people scattered, that hoarded all the light for themselves, leaving Middle-Earth with scraps of it to fight over. 

Mairon smiled to himself as he made his way over the grass-ridden planes and towards the gap in the mountains that provided the easiest entrance into the Land of Shadows. A makeshift gate had been erected to keep unwanted guests out, a wonky construction of pine wood that was manned with several creatures. If Mairon were to raise his hands and attempt to blast through it with his fire, the gate would dissolve instantly.

I will have to remedy this, Mairon thought, plans already forming in his head. The Trolls that had taken up station to either side of the door gave him an idea or two about a more stable construction. They did not pay him heed as he approached the manned entrance. An Orc sneered at him, a nail wedged horizontally through his nostrils, one eye obscured by masses of wildly growing flesh. 

“Who approaches,” he spat in warped Black Speech. That at least, Bauglir had taught his soldiers. A promising start. 

“If you have to ask, I should blast your head off, soldier,” Mairon said, exposing his teeth. He channeled his Feä in his eyes so that they glowed devilishly, and the Orc scrambled to attention.

“Master Sauron, forgive me.” 

“This once,” Mairon said. “Now would you let me into my own realm?” 

“Of course, mylord.” The Orc bowed deeply, then nudged a smaller door that was set into the greater construction. It groaned, but swung open and Mairon stepped through. He clicked his tongue and the Orc’s head snapped around, spine breaking. He remained, a heap of limbs and armor, by the gate. Someone would clean him up, surely. 

Mordor fanned out before Mairon in an explosion of colors he had not expected in the slightest, and it was a harsh contrast to the vision he strove for, the one Melkor had given him. Growths of elms and beeches hugged the mountain range from the inside, taller than natural and thicker. Perfect construction material, but Mairon did not deal in branch and bark, and neither would the future King of the World. 

Against the rows of trees nestled clusters of houses. Red brick, sandstone discolored by ash, copper turned green by the fumes in the air. There lived those followers that had not yet turned Orc or never would. Families of Men that traded food and cloth, clusters of Elves that sat around fires and sharpened knives, sang songs, Dwarfen smiths that auctioneered their better works. If one did not turn their gaze inland, it almost looked peaceful. Mairon wondered about that. It seemed discordant with Bauglir’s goals and meant he had not yet grown into the leader Mairon had hoped for. He would have to remedy this, too. 

Towards Mordor’s center, the colors faded. Houses turned into barracks, horses into aggressive Wargs with foam at their mouths, Men and Elves into Orcs and Trolls. Goblins scurried to and fro and everywhere, the stench of blood pervaded the air, be it animal, human or Orcish. Grays and blacks dominated, but here too sprouted surprising patches of tranquility. A basket of carrots that sat by a smithy door, a handful of sunflowers lining an archway towards an agora with a well, a human bard who sat with two Orcs, strumming his lute as though he did not sit in the middle of the origin place of the newest terror. Mordor was infested, unsure of its own identity, and in that less threatening than Mairon would have liked. An unfortunate, but not incurable malady.

Bauglir awaited him by their palace which too had grown since last Mairon had beheld it. Where before it had been a crude two-story building with a balcony, it now towered to half the height of Mount Doom with crooked towers, several stories of windowless stone. Banners hung to either side of the front gate, rough, blood-soaked linen that was frayed at the edges, a black hand painted across them with bold strokes. Apparently, Bauglir had taken the tales of Melkor to heart and meant to honor his creator in this way. Mairon’s chest swelled. 

Bauglir was the one chess piece that had not outwardly changed. He stood tall, dark hair rustling softly in the hot, sulfur respiration of the volcano, eyes aglow with mirth. 

“Ada,” he said and inclined his head in a mockery of a bow. “Welcome home.”

“You do not bow before me,” Mairon replied, and walked up to Bauglir. Placed a palm over his plated chest and felt the vibrating Feä beneath, the coiling, curling wisps of Melkor’s essence that were embedded in it. “How fare you?” 

“Better now that you have returned. I have done as I deemed profitable, but your guidance has been direly missed. Would you care for a tour?” Bauglir offered Mairon his arm. Black and blue pride wove through the air around him. It was remarkable, Mairon thought, how Bauglir’s emotions manifested as a sort of aura, even stronger than Melkor’s had ever done. He wondered if others could see it too, or if it was his privilege as origin of Bauglir’s spirit. 

“Later perhaps. I have work to do still,” Mairon said. He brushed past Bauglir, past their shared lodgings and the reverent Orcs that bowed and greeted them. He siphoned off their life force, ingesting it to gather his strength. They combusted, remained as charred spots on the dull earth. In his fist, Mairon manifested a clump of gold, in his other a hammer. 

Bauglir followed and though Mairon could feel the protests he wanted to utter as pinpricks on the back of his neck, his son somehow understood that Mairon would not tolerate questions. That this was the route destiny had chosen whether he appreciated it or not. 

Together, they clambered up the treacherous slope of Mount Doom, catching drops of lava in their hair and lashes like the children of Men caught snowflakes. Mairon blasted a hole into the mountainside and raised for himself a platform by the seething lava. Conjured an anvil from it, magma hardened by the ores that slumbered in the fiery depths. 

“What do you need, Ada?” Bauglir asked and came to stand beside Mairon’s new forge.

“Cup your hands for me,” Mairon demanded. Sweat beaded on his forehead and he slipped out of his heavy robe, his tunic. Bare-chested, he could absorb the sweltering heat directly into his body, use it as fuel for his creation. 

Bauglir cocked his head, eyes flitting all over the place. His anxiety to kill, destroy, dominate, was drowned out by the green-tinged curiosity that clung to his hair, curly in the fire. Obedient to none other than Mairon, he cupped his hands, feet rooted to the ground. Mairon used his own thumb-nail to tear open his wrist and let the blood trickle into the bowl Bauglir’s hands formed. 

“Ada, what-”

“Hush now. This will require some degree of concentration.” 

When there was enough blood to effortlessly cool his work in, Mairon let his healing factors fuse his skin back together. He braided his own hair, took up the hammer, and went to work. 

The Forging of the One Ring, as it would later go down in the written chronicles, was one of the greatest labors of Mairon’s life. It took him seven days and seven nights, and cost him another precious fragment of his Feä. It did not, as many historians later liked to depict it, occur with much fanfare nor grandeur. The earth did not shake, the mountain remained intact, the skies withheld their weeping for the wars the Ring was bound to cause. 

Looking back, it was a simple matter. One father, and his son, and an anvil between them. One piece of gold submerged in lava, pulled out, hammered into shape, cooled down in a pool of blood. One piece of script to bind its powers and seal its destiny. One Ring to rule them all. 

Mairon worked many an enchantment and hidden ability into the One Ring and upon its completion, he fell to his knees and offered it to his son.

“In due time,” he said, “This will be a symbol and a tool of your kingship. Let me govern it for you until your name can be known. Let me break this continent open so I may hand it to you on a silver platter.”

“I want it,” Bauglir said, making a grab for the Ring, but Mairon closed his fist around it and brought it to his collar bone. The gold sang against his skin, recognizing its kin.

“And you will have it. But not yet. Not until we have broken the Elven realms.”

“I want to be King now.”

“You already are, dear.” Mairon smiled up at Bauglir whose pretty features were cast in the same light Melkor’s had been, the night of Bauglir’s conception. Eerie shadows, orange flickers pranced over them, elongated his nose, sharpened his chin. Bauglir clenched his hands into fists, but even now, in the face of this mighty weapon, he could not resist his father’s authority. 

“Fine. But it is mine, I am merely lending it to you.”

“Of course.”

Mairon put on the Ring and felt power surge through him, raw and boiling and he threw his head back and laughed. His veins glowed, giving his skin a translucence that made him feel light and all-mighty at the same time.

“Come to me,” he screamed and the Nine answered gleefully, the Seven slower to react. They were not yet at their intended destination for although the magic within them surged at Mairon’s command, their metal was cold. When slipped onto the hands of a mortal, Mairon would seize control of them. He laughed, laughed and wished desperately he could share this glory with Melkor.

“Can you see it?” Bauglir asked eagerly. “My realm, my subjects, can you see it?” 

Mairon cast out his senses and he could feel them all. The Men that lived in their organized chaos, the horses that pranced the grassland between Mordor and the Misty Mountains, the Elves that resided in the trees of Lothlorien. The Dwarfs in their mines and the massive Eagles that circled the highest peaks of the world. He sought out Celebrimbor in his work-shop and found him exactly as he had left him. Hunched over a workbench, fingers clamped around a hammer. But… no. It could not be. 

At the center of Celebrimbor’s desk sat three shapes, blurry, hidden to the One Ring’s power. They were round, small, obscured, but Mairon knew Celebrimbor as well as himself, could guess at the true nature of these shapes. 

Three rings for the Elven-Kings who sat in their filthy lairs, lusting after powers the Valar would not grant them.

Mairon roared, stormed out of the volcano’s embrace. He had been deceived. He would take what was rightfully his. 

Mairon had not assumed his vampire form since fleeing from the Wrath of the Valar so long ago that the memory had faded to a monochromatic dream of another lifetime. With Bauglir’s birth, he had been reborn too and so his bones were sluggish at first, unwilling to budge. They had welcomed Annatar, rejoiced in his flawless symmetry, but they strained and creaked against the beastly shapes of wings and claws. Mairon folded in on himself, grappling at the rock he had blasted through, channeling his rage. His vertebrae burst from the skin of his backside as he shrunk, as his primary sense warped from perfect vision to hearing so sensitive, each of Bauglir’s steps behind him was an avalanche of noise. His fingers elongated, curled, then blackened and his skin was replaced with a leathery surface coated in coarse, dark fur. 

“Ada,” Bauglir exclaimed, rushing forward. “Ada, what is happening to you?” Before he could prevent the transformation, Mairon was airborne, the Ring clutched in his claws. His last words to Celebrimbor would hold true, it had been barely a fortnight since he had abandoned Ost-in-Edhil and he would return now, noxious and thirsty for blood. 

The Elven Lord’s manor was ridiculously easy to penetrate. Mairon had shifted back into his human form in an alley along its side, not Annatar, but smaller, sharper along the edges, rage pouring from his eyes and lips, and had knocked out the guards with a twist of the Ring. The tips of his hair sizzled as he strutted through the foyer, into the main hall of the building.

Celebrimbor sat by his lonesome at an empty table, his face obscured by coal-slick strands of hair as his neck was bent forward. 

“Returned so soon,” he murmured when Mairon hovered in the doorway. “Have you missed me?”

“The only thing to miss about you is the daily reminder of your fragility,” Mairon said, puffs of flame erupting at each word. He could not hold back. “How your neck would snap under the tiniest pressure, how deserved it will be when your line ends with your demise. I cannot say that there is much else of value about you.”

“Seems we both have spent the last century in the worst kind of company then,” Celebrimbor said, voice airy with a sigh. He shook his head and got up at the same time that Mairon stepped forward. They met between the door and the table, glowering at each other. “What do you want of me, Gorthaur?”

“Finally someone who remembers me.”

“Indeed.”

“And yet you have spent a hundred years by my side, worshiping me.” 

“I have nothing to say on the matter nor can I afford to tarry in idle conversation. State your business or leave this place at once.”

“You know what I want.”

“Then you must be aware that I cannot comply,” Celebrimbor replied. The guards burst into the room behind Mairon then, panting and wild, but Celebrimbor halted them with a gesture. They would be collateral damage in any scenario. 

“And what if I say please?”

“You would not.”

“What if I pry them from your corpse?”

“My corpse would be even less compliant. There is no way to get to what you want, Sauron. Accept it and leave Ost-in-Edhil while you can. This mercy I will show you.”

The impertinence. The pig-headed impertinence of Elves. This was why Melkor had meant to single-handedly wipe them off the face of Eä. This was why Mairon had turned his back on his Father and siblings. Unbelievable.

“You will hand me the rings, my own and the ones you thought yourself sneaky enough to conceive out of sight,” Mairon growled. He shot out a low arc of flame so that the two of them were caged in it. The guards cried out in dismay but did not dare approach the fire. Mairon balled his hand to a fist, raised it to the ceiling so everyone could see the ring that gleamed on his forefinger, glowed with the perversion of the Elven script. 

“No,” Celebrimbor said, stoic in his refusal to look at the One Ring. “You have no claim to them.” 

“I have every claim to them. You would not have possessed the craft or the imagination to forge them if it had not been for my teachings.”

“You would pervert them as you have the others.”

“Look at me, Celebrimbor,” Mairon said and he grabbed the Elf’s face, forcing the angle. The curl of Celebrimbor’s lip was defiant, his eyes contained storm-light. “We have spent countless days in each other’s company, hour upon hour with naught to nourish us but the clanging of our tools and the dreams of our creations. You may claim to despise me, but your heart still beats to the rhythm of my voice.”

“That was love for another.” 

“A fiction, yes. I am reality, inevitable, rational reality. Do you not want something real? Do you not want the world at your feet, the freedom to walk wherever your heart might take you without the nonsensical rules of your lazy Gods? Your people could be powerful once more instead of watching Men overtake these lands. Or is all of that not shiny enough for you? Not holy enough?”

“Your mind is full of death and destruction,” Celebrimbor spat, tone thin with acid, but as Mairon’s fingers wandered along the elf’s jawline, caressed the soft skin of his throat and leaned in so they shared breath, Celebrimbor’s eyelids drooped.

“And yet you thirst for my kiss. Hand me the Rings, Celebrimbor, and you may yet receive it.”

“I will not be your slave.”

“Have it your way then,” Mairon said, and let go of Celebrimbor’s throat. “Burn.” With a twist of the ring, Mairon disappeared, dispelled the fire and fled the hall before the Elves caught on to the fact that he was merely invisible. 

Not a week later, Mairon’s spies reported that what had been rumors before had turned into rock-solid certainty. The Enemy had returned, the Dark Lord Sauron, the Abhorred, and he had taken up residence in the East with a new weapon in hand. 

Not two weeks after that, first signs of resistance spilled out of Ost-in-Edhil. Eregion and Eriador were forging weapons, gathering soldiers. 

“War will be upon us soon,” Mairon said the morning Mordor saw its first downpour since his return. “And you remain hidden.” 

“So it is all going according to plan.” Bauglir grinned, knuckles cracking where he gripped the pommel of his sword, so like Melkor in posture and aura that Mairon let himself imagine, let himself dream that it was his master by his side, entrusting Mairon with yet another victory.


	9. A Return of Darkness

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Almost done, aaaah. This chapter was so much fun to write (everyone needs an emotional support goblin, he's the real mvp of this fic) and I hope you love it as much as I do. Enjoy :)
> 
> Warnings: violence, explicit sexual content

Daily reports of the Elves’ efforts at preparing for this war reached Mairon and Bauglir and all they could do was scoff at how pathetic they were, laugh at how outmatched the Children of Eru would be. With more of Mairon’s guidance and Bauglir’s renewed vigor at his return, Mordor finally had the direction it needed to nurture its vile inhabitants. The Orc armies multiplied exponentially, sturdy specimen grown in deep caves, risen from muck and hatred to defile all that was deemed pretty in the eyes of the Valar. Trolls the size of siege towers, not as clever or deadly as the Balrogs had been, but just as eager to turn bones to dust. Men too, poured into Mordor now that its leader had stepped forward, Men from all edges of the continent, discontent with the lingering influence of Elves, with the cadence of those of their own race that were blessed with sturdier bodies, longer lives. 

Alongside their forces, Mairon invested much of his personal resources into the strengthening of their infrastructure. It would not do for the Elves to plan an ambush or a siege to find a rickety wooden gate and a semi-stable palace to run over. He issued a great gate, so heavy it could only be moved by employing several Trolls. It was hewn from solid stone, suffused with beams of steel and titanium and its coloring soon made it famous as the Black Gate. As with all things named by Men, it was overly simple, but Mairon liked the ring of it. 

In an attempt to stick to the aesthetic assigned to him, he raised a fortress from the ground, higher than any building of Men. It was constructed as a spitting image of Angband’s towers, sleek and symmetrical with elongated grates that were as functional as they were majestic. It was made from the same material as the gate and before any Man could claim a name, Mairon christened it Barad-dûr, the Dark Fortress. 

Soon, Mordor’s might reached its zenith and when that day was upon them, the fabric of the skies tore open and through the fissure, the most ancient of all evils returned to the earth. 

Mairon noticed it first as an involuntary shudder that had all the hairs on his limbs stand up and his neck prickle with apprehension. He had built himself up at the sideline of the training grounds that had replaced the cottages and forests that used to line the mountains not long ago. After stamping them into the ground and utilizing the manpower they held for more efficacious endeavors, Mairon had repurposed the space. Even though Orcs were born with a lust for killing and muscles to overpower any mortal creature, they lacked the finesse Mairon would like for their reputation to have. He did not simply want the Orcs to hack and claw at anyone they came face to face with, he wanted them to outclass, overpower, make art of death. A foolish notion in another timeline, another age, but here and now, they could afford the luxury. 

“Mylord?” a Goblin croaked. He was positioned on a rough wooden stool so that his head reached Mairon’s shoulder, and he held a black-singed piece of parchment that had a long list of numbers on it which he checked off whenever the Orc in question had finished the day’s drills. With the masses Bauglir had created and desired for himself, there was no use in naming the Orcs. 

Mairon glanced down at him, rubbing his bare forearms. Mordor was always sweltering with heat, the air humid and oppressive and that was why of all the strongholds Mairon had occupied, this one favored him the most. He could forgive its lack of elegance. 

“What?” he spat, and the Goblin’s shoulders rode up to his ears. 

“You are bleeding.” He pointed a gnarly finger at Mairon’s face, and Mairon frowned. Looked down himself and found no traces of red, not a wound in sight. But then he felt it, run down his neck like the hot lick of a lover, and he touched a finger to his ear. It came away red. 

“What in-” 

_Ada_ , Bauglir cried out, piercing Mairon’s thoughts. His voice was shrill and high-pitched, like a cornered beast. _Ada, something is wrong._

Mairon cursed under his breath.

“You,” he stabbed his finger into the Goblin’s forehead. “Make sure everything runs smoothly here. If I hear of anyone slacking off, I will make their guts the newest fashion trend, are we clear?”

“Yes, mylord, of course, mylord.” The Goblin bowed deeply, swaying on his stool, but Mairon had no time to make sure he stayed upright. He gathered the folds of his vest-robe and bolted towards Barad-dûr where Bauglir should have been cooped up in the cellars, talking geography with their brightest Orcs. 

What he found was not that. 

His heartbeat skittered, his breath stopped. 

What he found was…

Mairon’s voice failed him, his throat knotted with emotion. 

What he found was a room splattered in blood and pieces of gray-tinged skin. The remnants of their commanding staff, blasted apart, Bauglir in their midst, his hands drenched in black gore. His muscles had somehow bulked up, his shoulders broadened. He was not merely taller than Mairon now, he towered over him. His face too had filled out, lost all its youthful Elven touch. Bauglir’s eyes glowed in a perfect copy of Melkor as he had been, before his Chaining and the Silmarils, before everything had gone downhill.

Mairon’s skin burned. His Feä thrashed in his chest, pulled forward, while incomprehension rooted him to the spot. 

“What have you done?” he whispered.

When Bauglir spoke it was with the rumbling, endless depth of Melkor’s base. 

“I could ask you the same thing, Lieutenant.”

Mairon fainted. 

He came to on a rug of furs in front of a fire place he did not remember building into the chambers of Barad-dûr. It proved unnecessary with Mordor’s climate and while Mairon and Bauglir spent most of their time in the fortress, planning, organizing, commanding, they did not have their own rooms, beds, places of comfort. World domination did not take beauty sleep and neither did the two of them. So it could not be Barad-dûr. 

Mairon groaned and turned to his back, shielding his eyes. Something had gone terribly wrong, he was sure of it by the dread that filled out his bones, had his muscles cramp and protest before they settled down. His head spun. 

“I thought the whole thing lacked heart, so I added the fire place and a few other pieces,” a deep voice, too close to Mairon for his own liking, said. It was slick with pleasure, and so like Melkor’s that Mairon thought he knew what had happened to him. Eru had descended at last to exact his vengeance on Mairon, had come to him in the guise of that which he loved most to lure him in and trick him. This was the end then. 

“Do not be so melodramatic,” not-Melkor said with an amused undertone. “Our beloved Father can intervene, but he cannot trespass on his own creation. There are limits to even his power.” 

Mairon rubbed his eyes which burned, dried out, lights dancing on the insides on his lids. His jaw popped when he ground his teeth. He had to get up, find out where he was, retrieve Bauglir. 

“Ah yes, the boy. Do not fret on his account, I have put him into a deep slumber for the time being. But he is going to be a problem we will have to discuss.” Not-Melkor paused, cracking his knuckles. He was somewhere above Mairon, exuding an air of complete ease with undertones of something musky and heavy Mairon could not yet place. It had his nerves go haywire, firing at random so his toes curled, his lids fluttered, his ears twitched. He wanted to crawl into the fire place and rest there. He wanted to know what was happening to him. 

“Come now, Mairon, I hope you have not mourned yourself bereft of your intelligence. Recount the facts, deduce from what you just witnessed, draw your conclusion.” 

Mairon took a deep breath. He could comb through the memories in his head, could apply logic, but his gut knew the truth already. It was incomprehensible. It was beautiful. It had him open his eyes and peer up, voice shaking as he spoke. 

“Is it really you?” 

Melkor lounged on a black sofa he had conjured, arms spread over the backrest, legs wide. His chest was bare where he had torn through Bauglir’s armor when expanding his muscles, and his eyes, silvery-gray, so vivid, Mairon had not remembered how vivid they were, were half-lidded. A quirk clung to the corner of his mouth. 

“Is that a literal question? Or a philosophical one? Are you asking if I am physically here or if I am unchanged?”

“You are impossible.”

“Now that is neither a question nor does it make sense.”

Mairon laughed, head thrown back. The sparks of firelight warmed his cheek and Melkor was with him, truly there. Delight filled him, replaced the dread and the nausea. He looked at Melkor again and a new burst of laughter rose in his throat, expanded his chest. 

“To answer your question,” Melkor said and his grin turned wicked. The air about him was laden with promise and that dark, heavy feeling. Now that Mairon knew who was before him he could identify it for what it was. Desire. “I have indeed returned. I am sure you can figure out the details for yourself, though this pretty piece of gold was rather helpful. Are you aware how much insight into your head this provides me with?”

“I-”

“Of course, you are. It has been so long, and I have spent all of that time submersed in nothingness. One tends to loose grasp of reality in the void, but I think it rather benefited me. Would you not say?”

“What does mylord refer to exactly?” Mairon asked, gaze raking across his master’s broad chest, his twinkling eyes. He did rather agree, Melkor seemed more himself than he had in forever. Cleansed of the toxic years of their downfall, the persona Mairon had followed into every peril restored. He felt his body spring to life at the thought, blood rushing to long-abandoned parts of it. He licked his lips.

“No matter now,” Melkor said and waved his hand. “Will you not join me up here, give me a proper welcome?” There was but one question left to ask. 

“Bauglir?” 

“I share this vessel with him for the time being, but as I said, he is currently asleep. We would not want him to spoil this moment now, would we?” Melkor patted his thighs and Mairon considered it. This was all he had wanted, all he had prayed for silently, day in and out, and yet, he hesitated. He could not ignore his son, at the whim of his master, buried deep in that body. “Mairon,” Melkor said, tilting his head. The word was revered, soft-spoken, a command Mairon had to follow. He teetered forward, upward and once within reach, Melkor grabbed his hips and pulled him the last distance, onto his lap. Mairon’s knees framed Melkor’s legs, his arms wrapped around Melkor’s bulky neck. He let his forehead fall to Melkor’s, a dry sob rocking him. His master’s skin was as he remembered it, dry and cold. Soothing. 

“This is better, is it not?” Melkor said. 

“Yes.” Mairon let himself relinquish control, tumble into their first kiss and then their second and soon they were clawing at each other, hands everywhere, mouths so thoroughly engaged that Mairon forgot the physical barriers of their bodies. It was a high unknown, masses of hormones spilling into his bloodstream that had him mutter nonsense against Melkor’s mouth. Melkor solid underneath him, rock-hard and cool, but his mouth was eager, his hands firm over Mairon’s hips, then up his backside, tracing the blades of his shoulders, then on top of them. He gently pushed at Mairon until he slid from the couch back to the floor between Melkor’s legs that had fallen open. His voluptuous thighs framed Mairon’s heated cheeks, his girth a great bulge before him. Mairon licked his lips. 

“Oh, I thought so,” Melkor cooed. He cupped Mairon’s face with his ringed hand, and opened his breeches with the other, his length springing free. Then, he guided Mairon toward it and Mairon opened his mouth obediently, relishing the earthy taste, the feel of his mouth being stretched open. Bracing himself on Melkor’s thighs, he sank into his crotch, swallowing the hot flesh until it hit the back of his throat. He dry-gagged around it.

“There now, lieutenant, I am sure you have not lost this particular set of skills.” Mairon peered up at Melkor who still wore that smirk. His pupils were blown wide though, and a flush clung to the tips of his ears. Oh, how Mairon had missed this. 

He lapped at the cock buried inside his mouth, wrapped his tongue around it as he slid back up, Melkor’s palm guiding him. His muscles remembered this, worked of their own accord as he sucked greedily, licked hot trails along Melkor’s shaft, supplementing this with gentle strokes of his right hand. Soon, saliva dripped off his chin and he took Melkor deeper, and deeper. His eyes watered with the strain and he had to gag around the tip several times before he could take him hard and fast, and then he was not actively working for Melkor’s release at all, but holding still, jaw clenched as Melkor grabbed Mairon’s face and thrust into it violently, groaning, until with an uncoordinated jerk, hot spurts of semen hit the back of Mairon’s throat and he swallowed, and swallowed, and took pride in how he had almost made Melkor lose control.

“Come here, let me take care of you,” Melkor said when he had let go of Mairon’s face. He pulled Mairon back up onto his lap and kissed the salty remains of his orgasm from Mairon’s lips, tongue slipping through them to wrap around Mairon’s in a lavish, lazy kiss that drew the last shards of Mairon’s sanity from him, drew moans and pleas. Melkor palmed Mairon through his breeches, deftly unraveled the fastenings on them.

“Please,” he mewled against Melkor’s hot mouth. Melkor wrapped his big hand around the base of Mairon’s throbbing length then, and Mairon arched into the touch, hips jerking in rhythm with the quick, hard strokes. Melkor broke their kiss to nib at Mairon’s jaw, mark the delicate skin of his neck with careful precision. 

“Master, I-” Mairon’s words morphed into a high cry as he spilled into Melkor’s fist, stomach clenching, his Feä jubilating in his chest. He had thirsted for a moment just like this. Mairon moaned through the last rocking waves of his orgasm, then collapsed against Melkor. Sweat-soaked and sated.

“And now,” Melkor crooned, teeth finding Mairon’s shoulder. He bit down sharply and Mairon cried out in pain, liquid limbs springing back to life, his body lapsing into a fight-flight response. “For your punishment.” And Melkor splayed his palm over Mairon’s chest, the Ring humming against Mairon’s skin, and pushed him off his lap so that he tumbled to the ground. His hair caught fire where it dipped into the hearth. 

“What-” Melkor held up a finger, silencing Mairon, he got up, started to pace the room and Mairon did not dare move a limb. Where before Melkor had exuded an air of calm serenity, of eagerness to reconnect, he was now glacial. His aura, a trait he had absorbed from Bauglir it seemed, sucked in all light and with a snap of Melkor’s fingers the fire died out. 

“There have been many instances in our shared history when you have disappointed me, Mairon. And this is one of them.” 

“Master?” 

“Hush,” Melkor snapped and walked up to where Mairon was huddled on the ground. He lifted one booted foot and placed it against Mairon’s sternum. With each word that followed, he pressed it down a fraction. 

“As I meant to say before you interrupted me so rudely, there have been many instances when you have disappointed me, but you have always been able to make up for them. Why? Because you are blessed with intelligence beyond what most creatures, even those in the West, possess. It is an obnoxious trait and I cannot help but despise you for it, but it has proved useful. Do you follow me?” Melkor paused and Mairon nodded, all oxygen pressed from his lungs. The tone with which his master went on was sharp and angry, spittle flying. A layer of frost settled over Mairon’s body and always, that foot pressed down. He did not dare struggle. 

“It would make sense then, for me to assume that, if I were to concoct a plan that would assure I had a means of returning to Arda once my brother and his entourage had worked their magic, you would be able to comprehend it. It was a simple plan, Mairon. I plant a piece of my Feä in you so you may safeguard it. And I confess, perhaps it was too blatant for someone who loves over-complicating things as much as you do. But did you really have to go ahead and create life with what I gave you? Were you so desperate to follow in the footsteps of your former master that you stooped this low? You craft a vessel for that fragment, you give it MY name, and raise it as a son, promise to that creature kingship, not stopping to think for one second what this might mean, not trusting I would return to your side. You may call it clever, you may call it an act of loneliness. I call it blasphemy.” At that, Mairon’s bones gave way, splintering in his chest. Before the pain could register with him, Melkor had deserted the room. 

After that, Mairon went back to his work as though nothing had transpired between them. There were glimpses of Bauglir when Melkor allowed it for his input was not all useless. There were longer patches of his presence too where he struggled against Melkor and managed to banish him to the back of his mind. These were filled with frantic volleys of questions and pleas, and Mairon could do naught but hang his head and keep quiet. 

Time and time again, both Melkor and Bauglir put his loyalties to the test, forced him to choose between his master and his son, and he came up short every time. His loyalties were unquestionable, to Melkor, always to Melkor, but there was a fraction of him, some visceral instinct that wanted to stick up for Bauglir. 

“If this is the father you have always told me of,” Bauglir hissed on one occasion when he found Mairon in his forge in Mount Doom’s rumbling maw. “I want him not. He would seize my place and extinguish me. He is cruel and selfish.”

He is everything I tried to teach you to be, Mairon thought, but he did not reply, and Bauglir stormed off with angry tears glistening on his cheeks. 

“If you keep consulting with the boy behind my back, I will have rid myself of him for good,” Melkor said later that day when Mairon rattled off the day’s proceedings. Mairon sunk to one knee, head bowed. He did not protest.

So it went on, Melkor and Bauglir grappling for dominance over their shared body, Mairon a helpless bystander. He did not pledge himself to either over the other and because of it lost them both. 

“I cannot keep doing this,” he said to the Goblin on his stool. The sun was veiled behind a thick mist that Mount Doom had spewed into the air over night, but her heat had been trapped under it and Mairon sweated gloriously. 

“Mylord?” the Goblin croaked. His piece of coal broke when he flinched as Mairon put a hand to his shriveled, bald head. 

“Enough of this nonsense,” he said. “Eregion has simmered long enough and our Orcs are more than ready. Let us go to war.” 

“Should we not consult with Lord Bauglir, ah I mean Morgoth, I mean.” The Goblin shrugged, a little cross-eyed. Mairon could sympathize with him. The constant change of gears between Bauglir’s hesitant command, always supplemented by Mairon’s comments, and Melkor’s relentless expectations had given their soldiers a bad case of whiplash. 

“Depends on the time of day, but I can convince either, I suppose. Congratulations, commander, you have just been given a promotion. Gather our troops, bring out the drums. We march by nightfall.” Bauglir rejoiced in the idea, Melkor too had to admit it was the logical next step. The other Rings of Power were still in Celebrimbor’s clutches and yet, the Elven houses of old were weakened. It was there that the first strike would hit the hardest. 

And thus began the War of the Elves and Sauron, the first in their new campaign for dominion over Middle-Earth.

For some seven years, Mordor’s army swarmed Eriador, skirmishes going back and forth, and Mairon gained ground. Many of the Elves fled, some into the depths of Khazad-dûm, but even there Mairon’s hordes found them with the help of Celebrimbor’s secret door, revealed so long ago and to another being. Ergeion was ransacked, dusted and Celebrimbor himself had the misfortune of meeting Mairon on the battlefield. It was a vicious battle in which Mairon finally released the foul hatred he had harbored for the Elf since Annatar had dissolved, and it ended with Celebrimbor on a stake, woven around as a banner for the Elves to cry over. Feänor’s house ended, its last heir known to be alive, fallen. In that raid too, Mairon reclaimed the Nine and the Seven, and he quested for the Three who were still hidden from him, especially now that Melkor would not part with the One, not even for the purpose of winning this war.

Mairon thought himself victorious, he thought to bring home glory. He had not bargained for Men interfering. Had not thought that the line of Elros would risk itself to aid their progenitor’s twin. Defeat was imminent, but it was not total. Much had been lost to the Elves, much gained for Mordor. 

Mairon fled the battlefield, sacrificing the remainder of the force he had brought. He felt ambiguous, neither triumphant nor vanquished. Melkor did not give him a warm welcome. 

Mordor was not deserted by a long shot. Mairon had taken a major part of their Orcs, all Trolls but the ones that manned the Black Gate, and hordes of Goblins, but Melkor and Bauglir had not been idle and the magma-coated hills brimmed with as many dark creatures as Mairon had invested into the war. The infrastructure had fallen victim to Melkor’s rough hand, barracks decayed, training grounds desolate fields. The Orcs lived in caves and holes, forges and watchtowers the only structures left that spoke of a system. It was organized chaos. It was Melkor’s way and that gave Mairon a twinge of homesickness, but it had him halt too. Halt before Barad-dûr’s towering beauty and stare up at it with a fear rooted in his stomach. What creature would he meet inside? Who would greet him? None of Mordor’s newest ambiance had Bauglir’s signature. 

The answer appeared at his side not seconds after Mairon had stopped, stealthy and quiet. Melkor’s oppressive aura made Mairon swallow heavily. 

“Welcome home,” Melkor said. The Ring sang a song of greeting to its siblings in Mairon’s pockets. “There is no need to report to me, I have seen all that transpired. Not your best effort.”

“Men,” Mairon muttered.

“Indeed. You thought their arrogance would make them uncooperative. A just presumption, but you of all people should know to prepare for every eventuality.”

“It is not like you provided reserves. Nor any sort of aid.”

“It was your war. If you had asked for help, I would have been happy to give it. Though I must admit Bauglir made quite the case for sending reinforcements, he inherited at least some of your more convincing traits.”

“How is he?” Mairon asked, unable to help himself. Melkor balled his hand into a fist and the earth shifted underneath them, as if it wanted to flee the vicinity. His rage tasted rotten on the air. 

“Gone.” 

“Gone?” Mairon whispered. He kept his gaze fixed to Barad-dûr’s gleaming exterior. Something tore apart in his chest. 

“Yes. He got to be impertinent and annoying. His mind was underdeveloped and his arrogance disproportionate. I exterminated him.”

“You killed him. How could you?” 

“How could I not? There was nothing to gain from keeping him around.”

“Have you no regard for my feelings on the matter?” Mairon asked, voice hollow. Just like that, years of raising Bauglir to greatness, teaching him the ways of evil, the skills to best the best, evaporated. Gone. He was gone. 

“Hardly. Now do stop making such a fuss, I have an announcement to make.” 

Melkor turned towards his realm and cleared his throat, and, though it was but a faint noise, a hush fell over Mordor. The crows landed on the skewed barrack roofs around them, the Orcs halted their efforts. Melkor gestured towards a wagon that bore a cage stuffed with human slaves. A shriek filled the silence as the Troll in charge of the prisoners pried the cage open. They screamed and cried, but he did not touch them. 

“You may walk freely,” Melkor said and bared his teeth at the huddled, dirty faces. They clustered even closer. Mairon bit his own lip. He had no notion of Melkor’s plans and wanted no part in them, not when he was fuming as he was. Chided and bereft and utterly unappreciated. He had just fought one of the most crucial wars in this round of the Battle for Middle-Earth. He had sacrificed his son to Melkor’s dominion. And all the gratitude offered to him was non-expulsion. He would not risk it after all. “Under one condition. When you leave Mordor you will spread the word of my return. Tell everyone that Morgoth has risen once more. Tell them that he is whole and sane. Tell them he has assumed his rightful titles of Lord of the Earth and King of Men. Tell them that they will pay for their ignorance.” 


	10. A Reunion of Lovers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we are, at last. This has been quite a ride and I wanted to thank every one who's read along, left likes and comments and enjoyed the fic (or hated it, really, I could get behind that too:D). There may or may not be other fics and ficlets set in this universe because the way I constructed this fic leaves a lot of space for smaller ideas to be explored. Certainly, I want to dive more into the Bauglir-Mairon dynamic at some point. I hope you enjoy this conclusion and if you wanna chat about this fic or Angbang in general or anything really, hit me up on tumblr :) 
> 
> Tws: violence

Repercussions of Melkor’s great proclamation arrived in the guise of a procession of Men. Mairon was unable to tell how long it had taken them to react, and he did not care. Time had taken on an eolian quality, full of eroded patches and airy spaces, and Mairon cared no longer for its passage. Melkor had seized command of their armies, whipped them through raid after raid, attack after attack, drenching Middle-Earth in blood. Gone was the lethargy he had displayed after the duel with Fingolfin, gone the paranoia caused by the Silmarils, gone the fear of battle wounds. 

This version of Melkor was brimming with thirst for action, an emperor worthy of the names he claimed and those given to him by others, and Mairon adored him for it. Alas, he was offered no part of him, and when his task list was blank, Mairon retreated to the passes in the mountains, towing squirming prisoners after him to release them in the lair of Ungoliant’s spawn. He used his fire to guide him through the caves coated in her silken web, trailing after her as she hunted, pincers clicking. Shelob enjoyed them when they resisted, fresh and stinking of fear. When he lost track of her, he took up residence on one of the dusty boulders outside her cave and she would dutifully return to his side, dragging her meal behind to devour it by his feet. It was those moments he missed Ancalagon and the Drakes the most, their playful demeanor and fiery temperaments. He did not let himself mourn Bauglir.

It was there also that he first heard them, trumpet echoing through the peaks, excited chatter that sounded like thousands had piled up at the Black Gate. An auditory phenomenon Mairon knew could be useful from either side of the entrance. A booming voice bid them to quiet. Horses neighed.

“Forgive me, but I must leave early today,” Mairon said as he slipped from his seat. He absentmindedly let his hands brush Shelob’s side and she clicked a question at him. Mairon waved it off and left her to her afternoon delight as he wove through the perilous passes and hopped over tiny abysses.

We have guests, he communicated through the link he had established with Bauglir. It had been quiet since Bauglir’s demise, but had not been broken by Melkor. Despite his wintry demeanor towards Mairon. Despite the fact that they had not exchanged words beyond cordial and necessary communications. 

_I know._

_Of course_ , Melkor would. With the Ring on his finger, there was little he did not. 

_What do you intend for them?_

_Apply your talents, rid us of their stench. I no longer parley with Men._

Mairon reached the gap in the mountains at last, hid himself behind an outcropping of stone. When he peered around it, he saw ranks of armored Men bearing a white tree on dark fabric. At their helm, settled atop a mighty black stallion, the usurper. It seemed like Mairon was bound to trip over the foul branches of Luthien’s family tree forevermore. 

_Not just any delegation of Men, Mairon said. Ar-Pharazôn has come calling._

_Numenoreans? Change of plan then, murder them._

_And what would that achieve?_

“I, Ar-Pharazôn, King of Númenor and all Men, demand that the lord of these lands reveal himself. I have come to put him to trial for his unjust claims and crimes against humanity.”

Mairon laughed involuntarily. It was too comical, almost adorable. Fifty heads whipped into his direction, but he remained obscured. 

_Please, master. He is a fool. There must be some benefit to glean from this._

_Fine, speak with them if you must, but do not let yourself be captured. You are too valuable._

A jolt went through Mairon’s heart even though Melkor was speaking from a strategical standpoint. And then, an idea. 

_What if I went willingly?_

_Explain._

_They will demand reparations to be made. Something to fix their pride. What if Sauron, the Right Hand of Morgoth, submitted himself to them. Let himself be taken hostage. I could infiltrate the very heart of our enemies._

_You would stoop so low as to become their pet?_

_For you? Anything._

_And will you offer your affections to them too? Will you spoil my reputation and endanger our mission as you have with Feänor’s descendant._

Mairon cringed at these words, wishing he could undo much of what had happened during his years in Eregion. Celebrimbor had been a trial-and-error process, and Melkor had pulled the details of it from Mairon’s mind when they had reunited, he was sure of it. The humiliation stung, bittersweet.

“Show yourself, Morgoth. It is time for you to face the consequences of your actions,” Ar-Pharazôn called out and as a collective, the Numenoreans thumped the earth with the dull ends of their spears. 

_I have learned from my mistakes and Men are much more gullible, easier to control. Let me go with them and I will run Númenor into the ground._

_Do not disappoint me. If this turns into another Tol-in-Gaurhoth, I will not be merciful._

_I will not disappoint you._

Mairon felt a new, viscose determination coat his skin. There was no use in dwelling on the pain and frustration he felt for his master. Bauglir was gone, Melkor was inevitable, and Mairon nearly back to where he most yearned to be. Here was his shot at reclaiming favor. 

He put on a sly smile and dusted off his robes.

“Welcome,” he said, magically amplifying his voice. “Welcome to our humble dwelling. How can I be of assistance?”

Númenor demanded much of him, as a prisoner and then adviser of Ar-Pharazôn he had courtly duties that ranged from simple consultation to great state dinners and offered ample opportunity to sow discord. He counted convincing Ar-Pharazôn to burn the White Tree as one of his greater achievements. As the High Priest of the Cult of Melkor his daily schedule contained the erecting of a temple, sacrifices and ceremonies and always, he spread discontent and dark visions of the future.

Throughout his duties Mairon pursued a certain reputation and he did it with flourishing success. The art of cultivating rumors was as intricate and treacherous as that of the lie, and Mairon took to it with the same basal instincts that had allowed him to sculpture the image of Annatar. He carefully planted the seeds of his cobweb of impressions and ‘did-you-hear-about’-sentiments that soon budded and blossomed into delicate flowers of alleged facts he could abuse, suck the life force out of. Basal, yes, but also tinged by all the afternoons he had spent with Shelob. Mairon enjoyed her flair for the dramatic, her blatant refusal to accept easy prey, and he replayed her skittering and clicking in the back of his head as he tended to his garden of rumors, his cobweb of not-quite-lies. 

Some of them burst from the soil more easily than others, of course, but sooner or later they all bloomed. He took most care of those surrounding Ar-Pharazôn in one way or another. 

Mairon stood on the highest balcony of the royal palace, a sand-stone construction that faced Valinor, and murmured to himself, tales of how his former siblings had betrayed him and cast him out, how they favored the Elves over every other creature, how Valinor was basked in eternal, vivacious and buttery light while Middle-Earth withered in evanescence. A member of the king’s guard always at his back to listen to these carefully placed words and to spread them through the housing corridors, at night when the darkness seemed its most perilous. From there, it was only a matter of time until they reached the king’s halls.

Míriel joined him too sometimes, and fueled these mutterings, made of them whole rat traps of conversations for the soldiers to lap up. She was drawn to hatred and thus to Mairon, who had been made of it. The fact that they were seen together regularly added to the spice of another set of rumors Mairon nourished. 

These were even easier to spread than those of the neglectful Gods. Mairon overstayed his welcome in Ar-Pharazôn’s chambers long and often, lounging on his bed with his robe slipping of his shoulder. The Man liked to gawk and with a carefully placed hand or two, a sweet word, Mairon would have been able to make truth of what he wanted the courtiers to think. He deemed it unnecessary though. Ar-Pharazôn ate out of his hands either way and he would not object to any claim that he bedded Mairon out of pride alone. Whether Mairon subjected himself to it or not amounted to the same result and he preferred to stay faithful to his master. Melkor was the only creature allowed to touch him in such a way, no matter if he ever would do so again. 

When Ar-Pharazôn retired for the night, Mairon took care to ruffle his hair, loosen the bindings of his robe enough it was obvious, and strutted out of the King’s chambers with a fabricated flush to his skin. By breakfast the next morning, the whole castle was alight with rumors of how Ar-Pharazôn had debauched the mighty Sauron. 

He suffused these blatant acts with smaller ones, noticeable to the more envious members of Ar-Pharazôn’s court. In a council, he would take the place to the King’s right and keep a hand on his thigh always, speak over him, drink from his goblet. When receiving peasants for requests, Mairon arranged for a stool next to the King’s throne where he sat, wearing a golden collar so Ar-Pharazôn waned himself the dominant part in their relationship. When riding out, he climbed onto the horse behind Ar-Pharazôn, nimble fingers snaking into his belt, breath hot against the salt-whipped skin of his neck.

The King’s Golden Whore, they soon called him, and more vulgar names, ignorant to the fact that Mairon wanted exactly that. If their King seemed omnipotent and was at the same time filled with hatred for the Gods, well. It was a combination bound for greatness.

Another patch of rumors was concerned with Men’s role in Melkor’s mighty designs and these he worked into his gospel as allusions and metaphors so the followers of the Cult of Melkor could complete the picture for themselves. Riches were hinted at, reputation abstracted. The inaugurates quickly picked up this vague language and so it spread like a plague.

The reactions varied with the rumors. Most Numenoreans accepted him begrudgingly as they did not dare to speak out against their King. Some worshiped him, swore oaths of loyalty, served at the temple and promised to ascend to Melkor’s side with him. And some met him with open suspicion and hostility. 

“You cannot have submitted to our rule when you master busies himself with plighting the main land,” they said, defiant of his position at court, waning themselves in safety by a more or less distant kinship to Amandil and thus Ar-Pharazôn. 

Mairon grinned then and said nothing to protest or assure them of their loyalty. He was all rumors now, no more lies. These deviants would end up on his butchering table sooner or later.

“A small price to pay,” he assured Ar-Pharazôn, fingers combing through the King’s rapidly graying hair. “What is a cousin to you compared with a seat in heaven?” 

And Ar-Pharazôn nodded gravely, head in the clouds, humming under his breath. 

So Mairon chipped away at the beliefs and structures of Númenor, whittled Ar-Pharazôn’s ideas in concordance with his aging, his vanity, his fear for death, all the while making sure that the King’s Golden Whore was known in all the land to be absolutely submissive. 

Melkor noticed sooner than Mairon would have accounted for and here lay another function of these rumors. 

_How is it_ , Melkor hissed through their bond. Goosebumps erupted over Mairon’s skin as he hovered over a Man currently tied to the altar at the feet of Melkor’s marble image. The statue had been built in only two days, erected at the back wall of the temple and under much blood and sweat. _That you fail me again, even though you went willingly and with a plan in mind, even though you promised not to besmirch my name._

 _Pray tell me what I have done wrong this time_ , Mairon replied. He licked his lips and bent lower to whisper into the victim’s ears. The Man struggled, strained against the enchantment Mairon had placed on him. A knot in the throat, so thick he was rendered speechless. “I sacrifice you in the name of your lord who you would deny so you may be absolved of your sin.”

A strangled whine. A squelching noise as metal carved open skin. 

_You have become the laughing stock of the continent. They say you are a favorite of Ar-Pharazôn’s. That you worm yourself into his chambers and make pretty eyes at him. They call you his Gilded Whore. I confess myself appalled._

_And I would have believed you to find the underlying thread of those actions. Your name is irrelevant, those who would curse it have done so without my help and those who would follow you are gathered at your feet. Do you not think that it is an advantageous position to be this close to the mightiest King of Men currently reigning?_

_Being close to him does not mean you have to let him defile you._

_I am not. Sometimes a rumor is simply that. You, of all creatures, should be aware. Mylord. Have I not always been faithful to you? Have I not given up everything a hundred times over to please you?_

_I do not believe you._

_Why?_

_Because, you have always been a lust-driven creature._

_Then you do not know me at all._

Mairon dipped his fingers into the puddle of deep scarlet that coated a third of the altar’s snowdrop surface. Then, he incinerated the corpse and turned towards Melkor’s statue. It glared straight ahead, stoic. Perfect. Mairon grinned as he climbed up the marble, propelled by his powers, until he was face to face with his master. 

“Jealousy does not become you, mylord” he said as he dragged his hands over Melkor’s lips, staining them red. He pressed his own to the spot, shivering against the cold the material stored. “But I do so enjoy it.” 

In the end, though it provided ample challenge and argument, Númenor was a respite more than anything, and though it pained Mairon to admit it, he had needed one. The loss of Bauglir had never been allowed to be a wound, not with Melkor’s awe-inspiring, fear-invoking campaign, and its scars ran jagged, unsure of what shape they wanted to be. Mairon found solace in the long mornings on the balcony, in Míriel’s constant self-deprecation, even in the gold-tinged nights in Ar-Pharazôn’s banquet hall. He found a channel for his anger in the never-ending stream of unfaithful lambs his Dark Numenoreans, as they so aptly called themselves, provided for him to slaughter and sacrifice to Melkor. 

Ar-Pharazôn’s company was lackluster on good days, outright dreadful on bad ones, but the old King was too useful and Mairon did not have to long until all his implications and subtle inceptions of thought paid off. He came to Mairon’s side as Mairon watched the sun descend over the ocean, a spectacle not unlike the bubbling rage in the bowels of Mount Doom. It was a sunset like any other and Armenelos would soon fall into the uneasy slumber that was typical for heavily populated areas. Always a light on somewhere. 

“My king,” he hummed when the gleam of Ar-Pharazôn’s crown-heavy brow appeared in the corner of his vision. “To what do I owe this late audience?”

Ar-Pharazôn’s breath rattled with the last legs of a cough that had persisted through the weeks past. Spittle hit the lobe of Mairon’s ear as he hastily whispered his request to his most trusted adviser, as if afraid that the Gods would hear those blasphemous words he spoke. Valinor was hidden behind leagues of Ulmo’s domain, ocean thick with algae and fish, but Mairon could feel it, like an ingrown nail, a constant nagging pain. They might just be listening.

“A just question, and easily answered. Oh yes, the secret to immortality is attainable, but well-guarded. The Valar would withhold it from you.”

Ar-Pharazôn raised an eyebrow, a skeptical skew to the hard set of his mouth. His eyes were wide, greedy for prolonged life as a certain Elf had once been for Mithril. As Mairon would always be for Melkor’s touch. 

“They will not hand it over willingly. They are gluttonous, jealous, eager to keep it to themselves. Wage war on them, I say. Set sails for Valinor and take with force what they would not share in peace. It is your birthright, Son of Kings.”

Ar-Pharazôn scowled. He did not appreciate it when Mairon reminded him of his unjust claim to the throne of Númenor, of how he had taken it without permission or honor. 

“If you do not,” Mairon continued, returning his gaze westward. “I fear your days are counted.”

Mairon was not foolish enough to step onto one of those ships. He slipped out of the palace before dawn, clad in his priest’s robes, from head to toe in black, and entered the temple which was deserted, quiet at this hour. In the distance, horns, a call for a battle that was bound to be pointless. There was no waging war on the Valar, Mairon had learned this the hard way. 

He sank to his knees by Melkor’s marble clad legs, head hung as if in deep prayer. That morning, he had taken care to brush his hair and let it fall freely, had forsaken all the gold and gems Ar-Pharazôn had so loved to hang him with. With steady fingers, Mairon pulled on the fastenings of his robe and they slipped off his shoulders, pooling in his lap. A cold draft caressed his bare stomach, his straight back. He pressed his hands to his chest, fingers grazing the connecting tissue of his ribs, even under the layers of skin. He had no physical scars, not like mortal Women sometimes did when they had given birth, but he could feel it still. How his skin had wilted and torn as easily as leaves of a tree. How Bauglir had burned him inside out. Mairon sighed and lifted his chin, glancing up at Melkor, tears a steady stream that dropped into his lap.

_Mylord?_

_Mairon._

_It is time._

_Do you mourn the loss of your new home?_

_You taunt me, mylord. I do not deserve it._

_That depends. Why the tears?_

_I mourn what I lost._

_You have me still._

_Do I?_

But before Mairon could hear the answer, the ground opened up beneath him. He fell. 

Mairon remembered what it had been like to enter Eä back when the landmasses had not yet been shaped and the skies had been basked in eternal twilight. Back when he had not yet garbed himself with a body. The atmosphere Eru had woven to protect and separate the world form the void was not friendly towards spirits as they were not meant to exist in it in the same way corporeal creatures would putrefy in the endless nothing.

It had been a pain that had, at the time, been indescribable. Aulë had not warned him when they had broken through the barrier, had not uttered a single word to prepare Mairon and Curumo. They had trusted him, had followed him, and it had been agony. Today, perhaps, he would have the vocabulary. Like he had submersed his face in highly concentrated acid. Like his whole being had been trampled by Trolls. Like a plant had sprung to life inside of him, its roots using his veins for space, splitting them open, its leaves sprouting in his skull, squeezing against his brain matter. Like a frozen set of tongs tearing the flesh from his stomach. Now, the metaphors came fast and plentiful, but they did not fit quite right. The pain had nearly ended Mairon before he could ever lay eyes on Arda and he had rushed into crafting his body to he could escape it. 

This was why, when he emerged from the abyss of Númenor’s downfall ere it could close over him, close him in, he braced himself for torture of the worst kind. If he was not careful, Manwë’s winds would grab a hold of him and carry him off into the wrong direction, or Ulmo’s waves would rise high and tow him under. If he did not channel all his might into a protective outer layer, the oxygen would unravel him and he would be diminished into floating particles of pure agony. If he did not regain orientation and make his way to Mordor within minutes, he would be lost.

No such thing happened. Mairon found himself at a safe distance from the cyclone of water below that gurgled and spat remnants of buildings as it closed over one of the greatest kingdoms Men would ever govern. Unharmed, and focused, not helpless against the storm that cooked above and below, not without direction or thought. There was no pain either, merely a tug, a visceral pull that guided him away from the carnage and inland, towards Mordor.

The Ring, Mairon realized, and had he a chest full of breath left, he would have cried out with mirth. The Ring tethered him. Guided him. And he had to do nothing, but follow. He wavered and levitated, high over the sea and continent, and all the land underneath him was covered in a great shadow while he passed it. He did not hear anything but the rushing wind, but he could imagine the panic that spread through the countless souls that gazed up at him.

The center of the World of Men had fallen. 

The Ancient Terrors had returned. 

More than a cataclysm for Númenor, more yet than the Wars of Beleriand had threatened. Who was there now to oppose Melkor? Who would stop Mordor and its metastases in the North and East? Mairon accelerated his pace, shimming along the connection to the Ring as if pulling himself on an invisible rope until the yellow grassland turned to black desolation, sectioned off only by Shelob’s lair. 

Before long, Barad-dûr loomed before him, a greater shadow than him, glittering obsidian. It repelled the ashes that clung to everything in Mordor, vibrated with Melkor’s emotion, though Mairon could not yet discern whether it was pleasure or rage. Melkor received Mairon not in the throne hall, nor even before its gates. He had taken up watch on top of it, higher than Mount Doom. With the Ring gleaming golden on his finger, he would see everything from this vantage point. 

“You return in a new vesture,” Melkor commented as Mairon engulfed him, unable to keep to one shape for longer than a fraction of time. “Its lack of practicability gives me the idea it might be involuntary. Here, this should work.” 

Melkor jerked his head and by his side a body emerged, from thin air and immaculate to the last hair. This too, was a perversion of the powers Eru had granted them, made possible with a simple piece of jewelry. A body from nothing. Mairon hesitated. 

It was not as he had been this morning, slim and handsome, almost Elven. It was not as Annatar had been, lithe muscle and tanned skin. It was not even as Mairon had been before Bauglir, efficient build with thickened muscles and skin prone to cold. Mairon was faced with a slightly modified version of his first ever body, awkwardly proportioned with long arms that seemed unwieldy, a dusting of freckles on nose and cheeks. Melkor had given him a healthy taint, auburn hair rather than mouse-brown, but overall the impression remained that of Mairon, the Admirable, Mairon, Aulë’s most promising prodigy. Mairon who had let himself be seduced to the other side.

“Will you not accept this token of my affection?” Melkor asked, staring straight ahead. He put one hand on the shell’s shoulder and it was the yearning for that touch, most of all, that made Mairon yield. He entered the body through the slightly parted lips, filled it out and it fit him down to the tiniest blood vessel, the last nervous cell. He blinked. 

“I have never known you to be sentimental,” he said, daring to lean into Melkor’s side. Melkor’s hand slid along Mairon’s neck, eliciting a small shudder, so many instincts and feelings suppressed, dormant, now violently surfacing, this most basic of touches enough to make Mairon want to beg on his knees. This was not broken. This could finally be whole. Please, let me fix us. 

“I am not,” Melkor replied and he finally tore his gaze away from whatever he saw in the distance, focused on Mairon. His fingers wandered on, cradled the back of Mairon’s head, and their bodies arced into each other of their own accord. Melkor looming over Mairon. Like they had been so many years ago when Mairon had still been the person this body belonged to. When Melkor had snatched him out of Aulë’s workshop and they had found a secluded place, away from the primeval forces of the world. “But you have always posed an exception to my natural dispositions.” 

Mairon trembled in the face of this confession. They had never been in love. They had never been each other’s romantic fantasies. They had never been soulmates. Those were all sentiments made up for and by Mortals, and of no use in the cruel world they intended to rake this one into. 

“You are right, of course, do not misunderstand me,” Melkor said and his fingers buried into Mairon’s hair. His other thumb and forefinger caught Mairon’s chin as he bent low. Ghosts of their stories passed as a soft breeze against Mairon’s cheeks as he tried and failed to think of an instance when Melkor had been this gentle with me. “We are each other’s destinies, Mairon, and that is a horrible whim of nature. It makes us vulnerable, makes me vulnerable. But I cannot escape you and you cannot exist without me. So I will permit us to have this spot of sentimentality which you have labored for so long. As long as it does not compromise our mission, of course.” Melkor smiled, genuinely smiled. The next words were barely more than murmurs, hushed against the heat of Mairon’s lips. “What say you? Shall we try once more to lay waste to the world? Shall we do it hand in hand, as our very essence prescribes?” 

“You know my answer,” Mairon whispered. His body was high-strung, electrified by the proximity, the prospects, the profound joy he felt. It had all paid off in the end, every day of Feä-corroding labor, every night of pain and torture, every crafted lie and constructed sentence, every day of submission to lesser creatures. A small price to pay for Melkor’s kiss. The ground shook with it, Mount Doom spat liquid fire high into the air, dry lightning split the sky in two. Mairon pressed his palms to Melkor’s chest, engulfed by his charred smell, the coiling darkness that surrounded the King of Arda at all times. Let Melkor guide him through their reunion, kissed him back with all the repressed desperation of the last ages, ecstatic with the knowledge that he would not have to face the next one on his own.


End file.
